Colomb, C; (2017) Place marketing and branding in (Anglophone) urban studies and urban political econony: a critical review. Γεωγραφίες/Geographies , 30 pp. 41-52.

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Abstract

The paper offers a synthesized account of the different disciplinary, theoretical and normative perspectives offered by the (primarily Anglophone) literature on place marketing and branding. It first reviews the changing context which has given rise to place marketing and branding practices, i.e. the widespread shift towards ‘entrepreneurial’ and ‘neoliberal’ forms of urban governance. It then reviews the ways in which such practices have been analysed by different disciplines, making a broad distinction between the body of literature linked to ‘new public management’ and the broad range of work falling under the loose label of ‘critical urban studies’ and urban political economy. Within the latter (which includes human geography, sociology, politics, planning, architectural and cultural studies), the paper contrasts two types of approaches: those shaped primarily by a materialist political economy approach and those of a cultural-semiotic nature. The paper then highlights the work of a small number of scholars who have sought to reconcile these approaches in a fruitful way to generate a better understanding of the politics of place marketing, branding and imaging and the role of the ‘symbolic’ in contemporary urban governance, to overcome the long-standing divide between ‘culture’ and ‘economy’, between the study of ‘symbolic’ and ‘material’ processes in urban studies.

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