Citation

Carter TF. City Soc. 2003; 15(2): 255-281.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2003, John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

10.1525/city.2003.15.2.255

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The 1998 Belfast Accord or Good Friday Agreement presented Belfast's civic authorities with an opportunity to rebuild much of the devastated city. Taking this opportunity, they began creating an image of the city that had rid itself of the problem of sectarian violence, even though the city remains a violent urban environment. Civic leaders recast the symbolism of violence to legitimate their gentrification strategies by controlling access to specific urban spaces in the city. This article plays with the different ways urban leaders contextualize violence. Their efforts to present Belfast as a cosmopolitan city contrast with workingclass youth's practices of engaging in communal violence as a means of rejecting their spatial and social marginalization, a results of the implementation of urban leaders' vision of the city, [space, gentrification, sport, violence, Belfast]