(In)Justice in the City

Abstract

This article deals with a city walk, (In)Justice in the city, which took place in the Haga neighborhood of Sweden’s second-largest city, Gothenburg, in 2016 and was conducted within the symposia Exploiting Justice. The walk started from Haga's peripheral areas and gradually approached its center, in order to provide space for narratives other than the dominant public image of Haga. Various conceptual and perceptive entrances were used for the participants' physical encounters with the five sites visited. At each location, complex layers of history, urban planning, and people's intersecting interests became visible. Although the walking tour generated responses from participants who spoke of abandonment, secrecy, order, and lack of encounters, it simultaneously opened the possibility for a variety of different interpretations of the sites. In this way, the walk can be seen as a critical performative practice that awakens many different voices and narratives, all of which can be included in a complex exercise of democratic society.