Abstract
While the concept of public space is frequently referenced, its definition is ambiguous. Current studies have attempted to clarify the definitions of public space. However, the supposed definitions of public space are usually contradictory upon further inspection. This article argues that epistemological assumptions are the main reason for these logical problems. The entity view, the preference for a real definition, and the concentration on “space in plan” should be changed. Inspired by Wittgenstein’s epistemology, this article proposes a framework for defining public space, which will help administrators flexibly and consistently identify the public nature of diverse semipublic spaces.
Introduction
Identifying the logic of being “public” has been a key concern of public administration theories for a long time. As for the concept of “public space,” scholars have elaborated on the ideas of “authentic public space” (Hummel, 2002; Stivers, 2002; Zukin, 2010), democratic issues (Goodsell, 2003; Madden, 2010), and the norms within public space (Harvey, 1992). As identifying a public space is a normative activity that shapes power and rights, the meaning of public space is an important basis of administrative legitimacy. The question of what makes public space public seems simple to answer, but the answer is usually elusive upon further inspection. After all, “spaces and places can have all, some, or just one of the features that we generally label public and yet therefore still be considered ‘public space’” (Parkinson, 2013, p. 300).
Especially, as the forms of public space today are diverse and far more complex than the traditional park or square, the norms and legitimacy based on public space might be fragile among contradictory identities. For example in 2003, a man was arrested by the authorities in upstate New York, because he was wearing a t-shirt that read “Give Peace a Chance” in a shopping mall and the owner of the mall did not like that (Mulligan, 2003). In this case, any further discussion about the legitimacy of the arrest relies on the identity of the space: whether a mall is a private space where the owner has the right to expel whomever he wishes or a public space that everyone, regardless of whether they supported the Iraq War, can access. Similarly, when an Arizona teacher posted her salary on Facebook to support the RedForEd movement, was this not a privately owned site used as a public space to try to elicit public concern (Castle, 2018)? However, if Facebook is a public space, does it mean that a law enforcement agency or government can legally collect information from people’s accounts as they do when monitoring what happens in a physical public space? These and similar subtle cases about semipublic spaces usually become normative challenges to administrative practices. They represent the incapacity of the traditional public–private dichotomy to identify “public space” today. A better understanding of what makes public space public is necessary to push the boundaries of current studies.
Although numerous studies have contributed to the clarification of public space, few studies realize a paradox: on one hand, people usually assume that some fundamental or universal essences exist in almost all public spaces. On the other hand, the concept of “public space” encompasses diverse spaces for different reasons. Owing to this paradox, the current attempts to develop a unified concept (framework) of public space more or less face logical problems.
Following Wittgenstein’s philosophy, this article advocates for reexamining the basic assumptions that we apply to understand the concept of public space and provides implications for future public space studies. This article (a) reviews problems that stem from the contradictory identities of public space; (b) examines the logic of the approaches that are currently applied to clarifying the concept of public space; (c) summarizes the current epistemological assumptions as the cause of the logical problems; and (d) finally, proposes a new framework that uses an analysis of shopping malls and Facebook.
The Negative Effects of the Ambiguity of Public Space
Public space is an important concept (Kohn, 2004; Mitchell, 1995, 2003), but the ambiguity of “public space” is problematic. Through its evolution and multiple applications, “public space” has become an umbrella term. By any definition, we can always find special cases that violate (or fulfill) some items of the generic definition of public space but are still considered public spaces (or not). More importantly, identifying a public space legitimizes a specific structure of rights and power. The contradictory identities of public space challenge the legitimacy of administrative practices in three respects.
First, the contradictory identities of public space threaten the logical consistency of the government incentive system. Public space is an important public good. Governments usually encourage the production of public space by offering economic incentives. For example, beginning in 1961, the city of New York granted floor area and height bonuses to developers who agreed to provide public spaces in their construction projects (Kayden, 2000). The underlying logic of such government incentives is that the government should pay for the public nature of public spaces.
In addition to the various contradictory understandings of what being public means, the rationale of the incentive system is also inconsistent. For example, in Pruneyard Shopping Center v. Robins (1980), the Supreme Court of the United States confirmed that states can expand the reach of their citizens’ free speech rights into shopping malls (Callies & Breemer, 2000, p. 53). States can elect to consider a mall a public space, being a “city within a city” (Levine, 2005, p. 289). However, if a mall is a “city within a city” and plays the role of being a public space, should local governments also grant the floor area bonus for the public nature of the commercial mall as a “public space?” Why or why not? Few legal studies respond to this question.
Second, agreement on when and where public laws and norms should be applied is elusive. Private properties masquerading as public spaces have become a prominent phenomenon. When the economic interests of private owners are in tension with the norms of public spaces, the different identities of public spaces directly endorse different legal rights and powers. For example, the most controversial point of the case of Kreimer v. Bureau of Police for the Town of Morristown (1992) is whether the public library has the right to refuse access to a man lacking adequate hygiene. If this library rented its rooms from a private shopping mall instead, the discussion of the case might be completely different. According to the laws of private property protection, private owners of the mall can legally refuse access at the front door to any patron with extreme odor. In that case, the man would probably not be allowed to walk through the mall to reach the library. In other words, the same library offering the same services would have different powers merely due to the different identities of the rooms that the library rents.
Third, it is difficult for spatial administrations to form solid legitimacy without a better understanding of what makes public space public. Competition among multiple groups, focusing on who has the rights to use which space, often happens in public spaces (Mitchell, 2003; Smithsimon, 2008). As Mitchell (1995) states, “public space is the product of competing ideas about what constitutes that space . . . and who constitutes ‘the public’” (p. 115). The public nature of a space is derived from when “some group or another takes space and through its actions makes it public” (Mitchell, 2003, p. 35). In other words, the identity of public space is not permanent but rather continually changing. The administrative practices regarding such a space should take into account people’s dynamic spatial activities in each particular case rather than mechanically enforce laws.
By and large, understanding the meaning of the term “public space” is crucial for the legitimacy of the incentive system, regulations, and law enforcement. Without a consistent explanation about why the same space might be public in one field but not in another, the related administrative practices will always be controversial. In this regard, the unification of the meaning of public space proposed by Goodsell (2003) is indeed necessary.
Logical Problems in Identifying Public Space
In terms of clarifying public space, the current approaches are more or less confronted with a paradox: on one hand, they usually assume that some features, such as inclusivity, accessibility, or public ownership, are essential and make a particular space public. On the other hand, no single feature is a sufficient or necessary condition for identifying a public space because diverse spaces without universal features still fall under the same concept of “public space.” Therefore, for any rigid definition of public space, the exceptions present a great challenge.
Defining Public Space as a Metaphorical Term
Metaphorically defining public space is the first approach. When the concept of public space is used metaphorically, it does not refer to a physical space but rather to a space of initiative, in which free individuals can make collective discussions about common interests and issues (Iveson, 2007, p. 17). If any physical space is used for this purpose, this space is public, regardless of other spatial features. For example, Habermas (1989) identifies private coffeehouses and salons as “public sphere,” in which citizens form public opinion, even though these spaces are open to only the educated bourgeoisie. Similarly, Arendt (1958) defines a public space as a place of appearance, where “men act together in concert” (p. 4). Under this definition, “a private dining room in which people gather to hear a Samizdat or in which dissidents meet with foreigners can become a public space . . .”(Benhabib, 1993, p. 102). As the metaphorical definition of public space is not associated with physical features, “public space” becomes an intellectual concept rather than a specific physical location. The metaphorical definition of public space can be employed in almost all types of physical spaces without logical contradictions.
The problem is, without tangible content, the identification of metaphorical public space would be split by opposing political ideologies. That would make the concept of public space even more enigmatic. For example, in criticizing the work of Habermas, Belina (2011) notes that the bourgeois “public space” is an ideology, which usually equates “public” with the exclusion of urban “undesirables.” In this regard, privatization gradually erodes traditional public spaces (Mitchell, 1995; Sorkin, 1992). However, the analysis of communist countries might be an opposed case: Drummond (2000) summarizes that Vietnam has little history of public spaces but a social vacuum filled by the authority of the state (p. 2382). She excludes the accessible spaces from her identification of public space because spatial management in Vietnam follows the decisions of the government rather than the “people.” In other words, a publicly owned open space could mean “nonpublic” in this view.
This contradiction related to the ideologies reveals the problem of the metaphorical definition of public space. If every place could be a public space, then every place could also not be a public space. If a publicly used space is controlled by private owners, the excluded “undesirables” might lose their status of having an Arendtian appearance. However, if a space is under the control of the public sector, the space might not represent the educated bourgeoisie’s opinions and willingness. After all, what constitutes the “people” depends on political ideologies. The ambiguity of public space cannot be clarified if public space is identified almost arbitrarily by opposing ideologies.
Defining Public Space by its Essential Features
The second approach attempts to anchor the concept of public space based on its essential features. If a physical space has the supposed essential features, it is a public space. Common essential features are ownership, openness, free access, and so on. The underlying assumption of this approach is that there must be some essential features that make a space public, especially a “good” public space. With a relatively clear standard of essential features, the identity of public space could be made more explicit than it is through the endless debates between political ideologies.
For example, in current studies, accessibility is usually emphasized as the most significant feature of public space because it promotes social integration and fosters social norms and democracy (Harvey, 1992). As Carmona, de Magalhães, and Hammond (2008) note, “public space (broadly defined) relates to all those parts of the built and natural environment, public and private, internal and external, urban and rural, where the public has free, although not necessarily unrestricted, access”(p. 4). Similarly, Madanipour (2010) defines that “the more accessible and permeable a place becomes, the more public it will be . . .” (p. 9).
However, the problem is that to a large degree, these features are as vague as the concept of public space, albeit the meanings of these features are usually taken for granted. Without a clear identification of the features, the concept of public space would not be rigorously defined.
Examining accessibility further, no place can be open to absolutely everyone (Merrifield, 1996). If a place is open to “hard drug dealers, crack-heads, pimps, muggers and rapists,” this place is not actually accessible to all people. People who are scared of such groups would become the de facto excluded group: “thanks, but no thanks: watching television is a better option” (p. 62). Social integration among diverse groups would not exist if the public space is not desirable to the intended users.
Accessibility is always associated with some type of regulation. Automatically assuming that any type of exclusion is bad oversimplifies the meaning of public space (Merrifield, 1996). The concept of accessibility is, in essence, the interpretation of who has the right to access a space (Bondi & Domosh, 1998), rather than merely a physically nonfenced openness.
If we hold that accessibility is the right to access a space, then accessibility is no longer a tangible feature. A physically open space can still be socially exclusive. Therefore, if accessibility is not explicit, the identity of an “accessible” space is still enigmatic according to the different beliefs regarding who has the right to use the space. Identifying the essential features of public space would not be clearer than using political ideology to identify public space.
Defining Public Space by Lists
As there are diverse reasons a place can be “public,” comprehensively listing all types of public spaces is another approach. The underlying assumption is that “public space” is a cluster concept (Kohn, 2004). Defining the concept of public space based on any particular feature would oversimplify the concept. With that in mind, outlining a range of possible meanings or criteria of public spaces might be a good approach because “a subset of these criteria grouped together would then qualify a site as a public space” (Kohn, 2004, p. 11).
Through this approach, the concept of public space is usually defined by its design, socio-cultural and political-economic dimensions (Carmona, 2010). Each dimension includes different public spaces based on various lists, such as designed facilities (Gehl & Gemzøe, 2001), places for everyday interaction and social gathering (Dines & Cattell, 2006), and sites of representation (Kilian, 1998), and different degrees of spatial control (Flusty, 1997).
The logic here is that because the range of public space is wide, no single taxonomy can exhaustively represent the concept of public space. Using lists is thus a way to present the nuances within the concept.
The problem is that making a list assumes that the included subsets are similar to one another, while also being different from the items that are not included in the list. However, as the list of public spaces is formed by contradictory definitions and various possible meanings from different perspectives, one “public space” might be obviously different from other public spaces but close to a nonincluded private space.
For example, shopping malls might be recognized as public spaces because people can freely access the spaces without too many restrictions (Levine, 2005). However, there are many other stores that people can freely access without buying anything, such as supermarkets and pharmacies. Some successful supermarkets can even be larger than a small shopping mall. Does that mean all accessible stores are public space? To what extent is a shopping mall more like a park (a typical public space) than a large, accessible supermarket? These questions are hard to answer merely by using a list.
The approach of listing is, to some extent, a circular argument: scholars attempt to answer what public space is by listing all possible public spaces; however, the answer to why these spaces, rather than others, should be included in the list depends on what is considered public space. If the criteria are contradictory, the inconsistency within the list can be even worse.
Defining Public Space by the Multidimensional Evaluation System
Using an evaluation system is the fourth approach for comprehensively unifying the concept of public space. This approach assumes that public space has multiple meanings. No single dimension of “publicness” automatically outweighs others. The public nature of public spaces is not identified by lists of features or a single continuum but rather by a quantifiable evaluation framework.
Németh and Schmidt (2011) developed an evaluation framework of publicness that encompasses three dimensions: “diverse/collective,” “public/government,” and “inclusive/open.” A space is not dichotomized as “public” or “private” in this framework. Rather, a space is more “public” or more “private” according to its aggregate score evaluated by the three dimensions.
There are many other evaluation frameworks of public space based on the same assumption. For example, Varna and Tiesdell (2010) developed the 6-dimensional “star model,” which encompasses “ownership,” “control,” “civility,” “animation,” and “physical configuration.” Neal (2010) evaluates the publicness of public space from “legal-economic,” “socio-spatial,” and “political” dimensions. All these frameworks aim to illustrate the publicness of public space through a multidimensional evaluation.
Defining spatial publicness using an evaluation system enhances the understanding of public space but is still problematic. This approach usually assumes that different dimensions of “publicness” are encompassed at the same level. Thus, the publicness of different dimensions is “empirically quantifiable.” However, public spaces are not all of a piece. A basic principle of formal logic is that quantities of different dimensions cannot be added together: adding an apple and a spaceship does not make any sense because we do not know how these two compare. Similarly, the publicness of public spaces cannot be simply evaluated by the quantitative aggregate of different dimensions. The presence of single feature that we generally label as public might be a sufficient reason to consider a space as a “public space,” regardless of how “public” the features of the other dimensions are (Parkinson, 2013). For example, despite its inaccessibility, a military base might be public due to its public ownership and public interests. A public park usually cannot be “public” in the same way. The low scores from dimensions other than “public ownership” would not make the base less public because the military base’s “publicness” is, in that specific sense, different from that of a park (Spock v. David, 1972). The logical problem here is derived from the assumption that “publicness” is monolithic when, in fact, the different dimensions of “publicness” are related but cannot be simply added together.
Epistemological Assumptions in Current Public Space Studies
How to develop the definition of a concept is a basic epistemological question in clarifying the concept of public space. It is impossible to clarify a concept without understanding what concepts are.
The Entity View of Concept
Current studies usually employ the entity view in defining public space: a concept is assumed to be a separate entity on its own. This assumption has a long history in philosophy. As early as the theory of typology by Aristotle (1994), defining a concept has been understood as demonstrating the “essence” of an entity. Therefore, the concept represents an objective category of things with similar essential features because essences are assumed to be universally true (Aristotle, 1975). Later scholars developed the entity view by including abstract ideas as the essence of an “entity” (Rodgers & Knafl, 1993). For instance, the essences of a “public space” could be concrete (e.g., the degree of openness) or abstract (e.g., accessibility). Thus, public spaces are entities that are derived from the abstraction of real essences.
According to this entity view, every concept is assumed to have the essential features that are the sufficient and necessary conditions to be that concept. For example, the essential feature of the concept “table” should be “used for placing objects on, to perform work on, etc.” (Sager, 1990, pp. 23-25). This feature is sufficient and necessary in identifying a “table” and exists in all physical tables. Other features of a table, such as “horizontal” or “flat surface,” are not essential because they cannot distinguish the concept of “table” from the concept of “chair.”
In the entity view, a concept should exist independently and have “true features” to be a category. Scholars might propose the “essences” of public space in different ways. However, the assumption that public spaces have essential features is prevalent.
The Preference for a “Real Definition”
In terms of the philosophy of typology, there are two types of definitions: real definitions and nominal definitions. The two types have different logics of what accounts for the characteristics that could set up a conceptual category. A real definition explicates the features of an entity about what that entity is, while a nominal definition serves to distinguish it from other objects (McGoldrick, 1985).
For example, defining the concept “gold” as “the element with atomic number 79” is a real definition (Carney, 1982, p. 87) because it can be objectively examined. In contrast, defining “gold” as a yellow metal that is very valuable and commonly used in jewelry would be a nominal definition because it restricts the concept of “gold” by other conceptual indexes that guide the listener to imagine the concept of “gold.” The quality of a nominal definition depends on the supposed image of the concept, rather than the true essence (Brownstein, 1995).
Regarding typology development, the preference for a “real definition” is another influential assumption. Scholars assume that a real definition will be more accurate than a nominal definition because a nominal definition might be arbitrary (e.g., Carney, 1982, p. 87; Cohen & Nagel, 1934, p. 262): defining “gold” as “the element with atomic number 79” is more accurate than defining it as a “yellow material.” Therefore, if a concept has both a real definition and a nominal definition, the real definition should take the place of the nominal definition.
Based on this perspective, a good definition of public space is assumed to be empirically explicit. For example, the New York City Council (2007) defines the “privately owned public space” as a space that “shall contain an area of not less than 2,000 square feet,” “at least 50 percent of … shall be free of obstructions,” and so on (pp. 34, 37). This is a real definition of public space based on quantitative indexes of scale.
The Concentration on the Space in Plan
The current approaches for clarifying public space are usually based on the planning features of public space (“space in plan”), rather than on the users’ activities and experience (“space in use”), albeit a metaphorical definition might be the only exception. There are several causes for this preference.
First, the space in plan approach is usually consistent with the logic of the entity view and the preference for a “real definition,” while the space in use approach is not always explicit. If the essential features of public space exist and can be objectively summarized, the space with the supposed features would automatically be public.
Furthermore, the activities and experience could be neither sufficient nor necessary conditions for identifying a public space. For example, a public gathering is usually considered a typical activity within public spaces, but it is still not sufficient to identify a public space. If a single-family house is rented as a sorority house, to some extent, the house is for public gathering, but it would not be definitively qualified as a public space. Users’ activities and experience are usually criticized as being too arbitrary to identify a public space.
Third, the ecological tradition in public space studies has also led to a concentration on the space in plan approach. The assumption that people’s activities and experiences are derived from the ecological features of a space is influential (Wirth, 1938). People’s social activities are usually assumed to be the result of a space, rather than the reason for the space: physical openness causes social integration, but the degree of social integration does not change physical openness. If a study assumes that the experiences are a result of the physical features, it logically excludes people’s perspectives from the production of the space. A supposed result cannot exist before the reason for that result.
A New Epistemological Basis for Clarifying Public Space
The fact that the definition of public space can never be exclusive and exhaustive is a great logical challenge for the epistemology of current studies. Clarifying the concept of public space requires a new epistemology to understand what a concept is and how it works.
The Dispositional Theory of Concept
The entity view of concept works very well if the supposed essential features do exist. However, lexical concepts usually have no clear essential features. After closer scrutiny, most of the “essential features” are not essential enough. For example, it is difficult to define the essential feature of the concept “violin” (Medin, 1989). Is “made of wood” an essential feature of the violin? Not all violins in the world are made of wood. However, if a special stone-made “violin” sounds too different from other wood-made violins, is the special “violin” still a violin? Even an expert on musical instruments would find it difficult to define the sufficient and necessary essences of the concept “violin.”
A concept should not be considered an independent entity. Rather, a concept is a “family resemblance” (Wittgenstein, 2001), in which the subsets more or less share a resemblance with each other but have no rigid or distinct boundaries. The description of a concept guides listeners to understand the resemblance of a concept, rather than forming a standard to determine what is true or false.
In this regard, clarifying a concept relies upon comparisons. The meaning of a concept is developed by people’s imagination and its specific use, rather than the essence of an empirical reality. Taking the concept “game,” proposed by Wittgenstein (2001), as an example, we cannot define the concept “game” in the same way that we define “gold” in the periodic table. What we truly do when defining “game” is restrict the definition to our imagined image of games (Wittgenstein, 2001, p. 3). In this process, we set up de facto criteria to distinguish games from nongame concepts, such as “has rules” and “is done for pleasure.” This definition neither exhaustively points out what activities truly fulfill the requirement of the criteria nor excludes all exceptions from the categories. Rather, it summarizes the general resemblance of the family of the concept.
More importantly, when people use a concept in their conversation, they do not always know or care about the essence of the concept. A concept is neither an independent entity nor the name of an entity. A concept is used to enable the conversation, wherein the concept guides the audience to imagine the image that the speaker intends. In other words, the use of a concept is an individual mental process but also a social interaction (Hallett, 1967). Once the audience is able to understand the concept, the use of the concept is not arbitrary. The understandability of a concept means that society accepts the speaker’s individual imagination as a satisfactory social reality.
For the logic of dispositional theory, the meaning of a concept is only observable in the specific use. The ideas that a concept expresses are more important than the concept itself (Ryle, 2009). The understandable ideas within the concept are fundamental for the “family resemblance.”
Nominal Definitions are as Important as Real Definitions
The assumption that the real definition is more accurate than the nominal definition is not always correct. Even though a real definition might be a fact, using a concept does not always mean dealing with facts. In some cases, the use of the concept even opposes the fact. In factual terms, a whale is a mammal rather than a fish. However, the United Kingdom’s former Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries included whales in its concept of fish when considering things that swim in the sea (Wilson, 1969, p. 4). In this case, the concept of “fish” actually represented an idea about what “fish” designated in the context, rather than the biological facts.
Therefore, when people use a concept, the meaning of the concept is restricted by context and people’s associated ideas. Even real definitions or facts cannot violate context-based imagination. Otherwise, facts would turn into lame arguments based on perverted logic. Suppose that a customer in a pawn shop insists that his motherboard contains “gold.” Factually, a computer motherboard does contain the element “gold.” However, it is ridiculous to equate the “gold” within the motherboard to the other “gold” found in a pawn shop. Using “valuable yellow material” here is more accurate as a definition than using “the element with atomic number 79.”
Regarding the actual use of a concept, a real definition could be an appropriate approach for expressing what a speaker means, but a real definition is not necessarily a fact that overrides other nominal definitions. All definitions should be understood in their contexts and interpreted by their implied ideas.
Space Users’ Activities Matter
If we recognize that the meaning of a concept is based on people’s use and the contexts of conversations, rather than on essences or facts, the activities within a space cannot be excluded from the analysis of a space’s public nature. Not all social activities are directly derived from the material foundations of a space (Harvey, 1989). As Lefebvre (1991) states, “in produced space, acts reproduce ‘meanings’ even if no ‘one’ gives an account of them” (p. 144). From this sense, the meaning and imagination behind the activities might be subjective, but would not be arbitrary. Rather, social activities engage with different meanings using the same physical feature. The space in use is not always the same as the space in plan. A planned public space might be eroded by private activities, and finally turn into a de facto private space (Sorkin, 1992), while a planned private property might be used and understood as a public space (Zhang, 2017).
Not only in the field of theoretical studies, but also in judicial and administrative practice, the concept of public space is by no means absolute but is rather associated with specific activities. For example, in the case of Lenrich Associates v. Heyda (1972), the court supported the exclusion of the group who danced, marched, played musical instruments, and burned incense in a mall. The debate about whether a mall is a public space for free speech is, in fact, based on whether the aforementioned activities are appropriate in a mall. Determining a place as an absolute public space without considering specific activities is impossible. The analysis of a space’s public nature always depends on what activities are being referred to.
A Proposed Framework for Clarifying Public Space
The current chaos regarding the identities of public space is derived from the entity view, the preference for a real definition, and the concentration on the space in plan. These perspectives assume the existence of an absolute meaning and segregate definition and context. Then, the logic is greatly controversial since no definition of public space can be exclusive and exhaustive. In this regard, this article proposes a framework based on different epistemological perspectives. In contrast to current definitions of public space, this framework focuses on what contexts should be included, rather than on any essential feature, to help the audience understand the supposed image of a public space (Table 1).
A Proposed Framework for Clarifying Public Space.
Family Resemblance
Providing examples of “family resemblance” should be the first step. These examples should be “public” to the same extent as the space that we need to identify. The “resemblance” could be a fact or not (e.g., calling a whale a “fish” to identify the shared resemblance of swimming in the sea). As long as the “resemblance” of a public space can guide the audience to understand the emphasized public nature, the family resemblance provides fundamental content about what “public” means.
Nominal Definitions
Nominal definitions restrict the concept of “public space” to separate it from other concepts. Although each of these concepts could be as enigmatic as the concept of “public space,” they play the role of a guide for imagining the difference between “public space” and other “nonpublic” cases. Depending on the specific context, we might need to apply different nominal definitions to distinguish what spaces are not public in the specific conversation. These excluded spaces are also necessary for clarifying the concept.
Specific Activities
The examination of which human activities the space is public for is necessary. Without information regarding what activities happen in the space, an identity would lose its basis. A mall may be recognized as a de facto public space in terms of some activities of peaceful expression. However, if the so-called “peaceful activity” is marching or burning incense, the identity would be changed.
These three parts of the framework form an integral whole meaning of “public space.” Without all three parts, an identity of a public space would be ambiguous and hard to understand. Although this framework challenges the usual way of identifying public space, the underlying logic of this framework is usually implied in the discourse of jurisdictional practices.
The Public Nature of Shopping Malls
In terms of identifying shopping malls as public spaces, most of the controversies are derived from a paradox: on one hand, the modern role of shopping malls is, to a large degree, similar to that of traditional public parks. People can freely access most malls and have social gatherings and recreation in the space. On the other hand, a shopping mall is, in essence, a commercial and consumerist facility. Masquerading as a public space is a business strategy to increase the number of potential consumers (Zhang, 2017). Therefore, the consideration of both the public nature and the private property values of a mall are necessary. With the aforementioned new framework, the clarification of shopping malls can be more consistent with multiple cases, norms, and laws (Table 2).
A Shopping Mall as a Public Space.
Family Resemblance
A shopping mall resembles a “public forum” in its public nature. For example, in the case of Ingram v. Problem Pregnancy of Worcester, Inc. (1986), the court admits that a mall is a public space: . . . we emphasized the emergent role of the shopping mall as the contemporary public forum . . . We said that although the privately owned shopping mall was not formally dedicated to the public, its common areas “have been dedicated to the public as a practical matter. (p. 723)
A mall is public, similar to a public forum, in terms of being dedicated to the public.
Nominal definitions
A mall is different from other common areas of freely accessible private buildings because a mall is not designed for only conducting specific private business or for only specific groups of customers. In this regard, Ingram v. Problem Pregnancy of Worcester, Inc. (1986) differentiates between the common area of a mall and an office building’s corridors. A mall is different from other accessible facilities that are for particular private business or groups.
Specific Activities
The generally invited and reasonable activities of a gathering of people create the public nature of a space. If people do not use the mall in a reasonable way—for instance, they march or burn incense—the court will not support the exercising of the First Amendment right to freedom of speech in a mall, but will rather protect the mall owner’s property rights as in all other private spaces (Lenrich Associates v. Heyda, 1972). Generally invited and reasonable activities make a mall a public space.
By and large, when a mall is considered a public space, this actually refers to its role as a public forum, its distinction from other private common areas, and people’s invited, reasonable activities. If these characteristics happen in a given case, then the mall is a public space in this specific context. The norms, regulations, and administrative practices associated with public spaces will be applied appropriately. In contrast, if the context considers the mall a real estate investment, or takes into account unreasonable activities or the mall’s similarities with other private spaces, the mall should not be considered a public space.
The Public Nature of Facebook
As another type of semipublic space, Facebook and other social media are usually as controversial as shopping malls in terms of their public nature (Table 3). The difficulty in clarifying Facebook’s public nature is derived not only from the site’s private ownership but also from the “blurry edge” between private uses and public gatherings (Gelman, 2009).
Facebook as a Public Space.
The paradox of Facebook is that: on one hand, Facebook usually acts as a cyber-place for people to present their personal experiences or post their personal ideas. On the other hand, a large number of the posts about personal experiences and ideas have public purposes. These posts are not for preserving individual interests or memories, but rather for raising public concern. The political agenda is controlled not only by political elites but also by political amateurs’ posts (Mahlouly, 2013).
The question is when individual interests and personal experiences are used for public purposes, to what extent should public norms and administrative regulations be applied in this new type of public space? Do teachers have the right to freedom of speech to complain about their jobs on their private Facebook accounts the way they can complain in their private houses? Can a law enforcement agency develop online surveillance of people’s Facebook accounts without the consideration of the Fourth Amendment, as they would when monitoring a public park? Especially when the analysis of Facebook’s public nature is related to someone being “Facebook fired,” namely an employee is fired because of his or her personal social media use, identifying whether Facebook is a public space is extremely controversial, and can even cause a chilling effect (Akiti, 2012; Kerr, 2009). However, the proposed framework in this article, to some extent, can contribute to clarification.
Family resemblance
In terms of basic resemblance, Facebook is public because of the role of “public concern.” For example, the case of Pickering v. Board of Education (1968) resulted in the rule that if people speak as citizens about matters of public concern, they are protected under the First Amendment. This is still a significant standard in judging the public characteristics of Facebook activities (O’Connor & Schmidt, 2015). Facebook is similar to other public spaces when it is used to develop public concern.
Nominal definitions
As social media, Facebook can be used in many different ways. Some information is for specific audiences, such as a specific friend or a family group. However, some posts or information do not have restricted audiences. Practically, they are accessible to and welcome any audience that can find the post. In this regard, Facebook is different from other online communication methods that are connected to only particular audiences, such as Email or a restricted online diary.
Specific activities
Although a post on Facebook could be about a personal experience (such as a person’s salary), if the content, form, and context reveal that the online conversation is related to political, social, or other community concerns, the online activity is a matter of public concern (O’Connor & Schmidt, 2015, p. 2). The activities related to political and social concerns make Facebook a public space.
Although some people might use Facebook as a purely private space, Facebook can be a public space and, to some extent, be consistent with social norms when the cases are associated with the above contexts. However, if the Facebook management team were to change its policies or people were to change their uses of the platform, Facebook might immediately lose its public nature.
As Wittgenstein’s philosophy implies, the identity of a public space cannot be absolute. The interpretation of spatial public nature should be flexible for diverse contexts and self-consistent for the appropriate application of administrative norms. In this regard, the identity following this framework will be clearer and less ambiguous, especially at the epistemological level.
Conclusion
The inconsistency of the identity of public space is, to a large degree, derived from current epistemological assumptions, which usually suppose that spatial “publicness” is an entity on its own. However, since the so-called “essential features” are not able to exclusively or exhaustively identify the concept of public space in either academic or everyday language, the current identities of public space face logical challenges.
Inspired by Wittgenstein’s philosophy and the discourse of law cases, this article proposes a framework based on a different epistemology. This ternary framework restricts the meaning of public space by the content in various contexts, rather than by pointing out absolutely true features beyond the contexts. Therefore, comparing to the existing approaches, this framework can more flexibly but consistently clarify public nature within diverse public spaces and contexts. In this regard, with a self-consistent clarification of a specific space’s public nature, the associated administration, such as arrests, surveillance, and regulations, has a better basis of legitimacy. Public administrators will be able to address the issues of semipublic spaces with less pressure or fewer challenges.
Although we cannot finish the exploration of the meaning of public space in one article, this article clarifies the epistemological basis and provides some implications for future research. It will contribute to the clarification of the public nature within diverse semipublic spaces.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Honkei Lai, Joanna Lucio, and Thomas J. Catlaw for their helpful suggestions on earlier drafts of this article. They also sincerely appreciate all comments from the anonymous reviewers and editors.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This article is supported by the grant from the National Philosophy and Social Science Fund’s major project (grant no. ZDA046), the Major Project Fund of the Ministry of Education (grant no. 16JJD630010), and the National Social Science Fund of China (grant no. 18CZZ029).
