Rethinking the Eventful City: Introduction

Rethinking the Eventful City

The ‘eventful city’ concept developed out of the basic observation that cities are using events to achieve a growing range of policy objectives, including economic growth, image change, social cohesion and physical redevelopment. The growing importance and scale of event activity in cities is driving rapid change in the relationship between events and the city. Cities are no longer simply containers or stages for events; they are co-creators, innovators, directors, managers, partners and beneficiaries of events. Events in turn are shaped by the cities they take place in, with their form, duration, content and effects being determined to a large extent by urban space, place and process. This special issue brings together a range of papers from the ATLAS Events Group meeting in Barcelona in 2016.