Veron, O; (2015) Deconstructing the divided city: identity, power and space in Skopje. Doctoral thesis , UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This thesis makes two main contributions. Based on fieldwork in Skopje, it first adds an original case study to the literature on urban divisions and draws attention to overlooked cities where processes of division may not be immediately obvious in the urban landscape, but which nonetheless exist. Second, it adds to an emerging line of research that seeks to find new ways to think about urban divisions and reflects on the use of static and dynamic concepts to describe urban processes. Instead of regarding divided cities as ontologically-given and focusing on a few cities elevated to the status of paradigmatic cases, I emphasise the processes that bring a city to division with the concept of dividing city. This thesis critically questions orthodox histories of Skopje as a divided city and the role of elites in fostering the image of division, from the Ottoman city to the socialist city, and post-1991 redevelopment. I explore how ideological and political dynamics and processes affect the lived experience of the city’s inhabitants and, how, in turn, the latter both take part in and resist the construction and division of the city. I show that the city as a lived environment may offer other narratives than that of division, in other words, that alternatives to the divided city do exist.

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