A Comparative Study Of The Old And New Shopping Malls Based On The Theory Of The Production Of Space

Since the 1960 s,capitalism has moved towards post-capitalism.Confronted with Marx’s unfulfilled prophecy,capitalism has engaged in the reproduction of relations of production in order to maintain,renew and expand its space of existence.Against this backdrop,Lefebvre developed the theory of the production of space.This theory discusses how capitalism produces the space of self-defence,the abstract space,while at the same time it activates the differential space,its opposite.This spatial dialectic is central to the theory of the production of space and helps us to understand the causes and processes of the production of urban space,in particular the new form of consumer space,the commercial space of the mall,known as the “cathedral of consumption”,which is at the heart of the abstract space that controls and dominates contemporary social relations.The aim of this paper is to examine the new characteristics of the contemporary UltraModern shopping centre and to contrast it with the old,what we call Modern shopping centres.Firstly,the paper provides a comprehensive overview of the history and current state of contemporary consumer space and consumption theory,identifying the new characteristics of the ultra-modern shopping centre and discussing their threats and potential in terms of the right to the city,the history of shopping centres,critical theory of consumption,public sphere theory and digital social media and technology.The theoretical framework is then constructed on the basis of Ritzer’s concept of Prosumption and Hardt and Negri’s theory of immaterial labour and,most importantly,their integration into the spatial dialectic of Lefebvre.In order to verify this,this study is designing a framework for empirical research to explain and provide evidence of contradictory transformations.The research scope of the framework will include data collection and analysis of both physical and digital spaces of modern and ultramodern shopping centres,comparing both abstract and differential spaces respectively.Six shopping centres are then selected for validation,and a two-by-two comparison is conducted,using mainly space syntax theory and Gephi-based digital network visualisation analysis as methodological guides for the empirical study.The results of the empirical study initially confirm and support the previous theoretical constructs.Among the ultra-modern shopping centres,produced difference is used as the primary means of control by the abstract space,manifesting itself in various architectural typologies or spatial narratives.Induced difference,on the other hand,as a bottom-up differential space,is excluded from the physical space by the abstract hegemony of the shopping centre and escapes into the digital space,manifesting itself as autonomous and collective immaterial labour based on representations of physical space in social media.These digital production and interactions are introduced as an emancipatory potential in the form of a “Trojan horse” by the prosumption model of the ultra-modern shopping centre.Processed by the biopolitics of the human being,mixing and entangling human subjectivity,the result in the digital domain is a differential space that mixes the perceived space and the lived space of the participants.This difference is both antagonistic and emancipatory,and it has the potential to destroy and blast the abstract space.