Community in times of crisis: IPM staying connected in virtual places

by Chloe Steadman


The IPM team in the virtual boardroom; Photograph the author’s own.

According to sociologist Richard Sennett (1994), the architectural emblem of our times is the airport waiting lounge; we are the ultimate lonely crowd, with fragmented and fleeting relations with other strangers; lacking any enduring sense of commitment to one another. This chimes with Augé’s (1992) observation that we are witnessing the spread of what he terms ‘non-places’ across the world, such as airports and shopping malls; homogenous environments in which these lonely crowds temporarily dwell, before dispersing once again.

This idea of consumer societies being characterised by a growing individualism, with fragile and transient social bonds, has become a common trope in academic research and writing. Such sentiments are echoed in Zygmunt Bauman’s series of books exploring what he calls Liquid Modernity; societies in which “…change is the only permanence, and uncertainty the only certainty” (Bauman, 2000: viii).

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Save the Date: IPM Study Trip to Athens, 12th – 14th January 2017

Aghia Irini square, Athens
Aghia Irini square, Athens

Join us for another IPM study trip – this time to Athens, Greece.

This 3-day accredited educational trip to Athens is a combination of site visits, lectures & workshops as well as meetings with local place managers (local partnerships, markets, town centre revewal, local initiatives, local tourism etc.). Athens is a particularly interesting case study as Place Management here takes place in an extended economic crisis with the voluntary sector often taking over the role of both state and private sector.

Check the IPM site for regular updates

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