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The Politics of Place: Heterogeneous Networks in Three New South Wales Local Government Areas

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The Politics of Place: Heterogeneous Networks in Three New South Wales Local Government Areas The Politics of Place: Heterogeneous Networks in Three New South Wales Local Government Areas This thesis is presented in fulfilment of the award of the degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY from THE UNIVERSITY OF WOLLONGONG by TRAVIS ANTHONY HOLLAND, BCMS (HONS), BA SCHOOL OF THE ARTS, ENGLISH AND MEDIA 2017 Certification I, Travis A. Holland, declare that this thesis, submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Doctor of Philosophy, in the School of The Arts, English and Media, University of Wollongong, is wholly my own work unless otherwise referenced or acknowledged. The document has not been submitted for qualifications at any other academic institution. Signed: 24 April, 2017 i Table of Contents Certification i Table of Contents ii Acronynms vi Glossary ix List of Tables, Figures, Illustrations xi Abstract xiii Acknowledgements xiv Preface xvi Chapter 1 - Imagining place: geographies, stories, governing 1 1.1 Geologies of space and place 3 1.2 Stories of place 5 1.3 The imagination of government 11 Wingecarribee Shire 12 Wollondilly Shire 14 Wollongong City 15 1.4 Imagining a capital 16 1.5 Structure of the thesis 20 Chapter 2: Locating the politics of place 26 2.1 Politics of place: contested imaginings in a complex network of heterogeneous agents 31 ii Contesting place 32 Location and place 35 Heterogeneous participants in the networks of place 37 2.2 Media: sensory apparatus and participatory tool 39 2.3 Whence the public? 52 Public as space of communication 52 Thing-publics 54 The participatory public 56 2.4 Local government, placemaker 58 2.5 Conclusion 62 Chapter 3: A methodology for addressing the complexity of place 64 3.1 Why Local Government? 68 3.2 Situated interpretation 73 3.3 Methods of heterogeneity: from case studies to digital imaginaries 78 Case studies: interviews and textual analysis 79 Digital research methods and visualisation 89 3.4 Conclusion 90 Chapter 4: Council created mediated imagining of place 92 4.1 Mapping local government media networks 93 4.2 Imagining tourist places 103 4.3 Planning space and mapping 112 iii 4.4 Conclusion 122 Chapter 5: Contesting the politics of place through council initiated public participation processes 123 5.1 Mediated spaces of community engagement in the politics of place 125 Use of the IAP2 Public Participation Spectrum 129 ‘Anytime, any place, any topic’: Bang The Table and Engage Wollondilly 135 Public Spaces Public Life Wollongong 143 5.2 Facebook and Twitter engagement 145 5.3 Conclusion 161 Chapter 6: Citizen imagining of place 163 6.1 ‘Gramming' place 165 6.2 Negotiating place on participatory media 177 Green Mile Action Group 177 Stop Wilton Airport Group 181 The Battle for Berrima 184 Conclusion 187 6.3 Imagining place in blogs and community news sites 189 Illawarra News 191 Wollondilly Museum 193 Highlands Votes 194 6.4 Conclusion 196 Chapter 7: Non-local professional media imaginings of place 198 iv 7.1 Place of crime 199 The backpacker murders 201 ‘A town called malice’ 205 Corruption hearings 206 7.2 At the movies: finding place in film and television 208 Tricky: finding Wollongong on television 209 Standing in: Wollondilly or Canada? 211 ‘That’ll do’: rural imaginaries and the Wingecarribee 215 7.3 Conclusion 217 Chapter 8: Conclusion 219 8.1 Critique and suggestions for future work 222 8.2 A final note 225 References 227 Appendices 259 Appendix 1: Participant Information Sheet Example – Councillors 259 Appendix 2: Participant Information Sheet Example – Staff 261 Appendix 3: Interview Questions - Councillors 263 Appendix 4: Interview Questions - Staff 264 Appendix 5: Letter to General Manager - Example 265 Appendix 6: List of Council Policies/Plans 267 Appendix 7: Human Research Ethics Committee Application 271 v Acronynms ACELG - the Australian Centre of Excellence for Local Government. ALGA - Australian Local Government Association, the national industry association of local governments in Australia. ANT – actor-network theory, a methodological approach that examines relations between human and nonhuman actants in a network of associations. API - application programming interface, a method by which certain tools are able to integrate with and collect data from other services, such as social networking websites. CSP - Community Strategic Plan, a legislatively mandated document produced by councils in New South Wales. DBCDE - the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, an authority of the Australian Government. DEC - the New South Wales Government Department of Environment and Conservation. DLG - Division/Department of Local Government, an authority of the New South Wales Government (later renamed the Office of Local Government). DRALGAS - Department of Regional Australia, Local Government, Arts and Sport, an authority of the Australian Government. GMAG - the Green Mile Action Group, a residents’ action group active on social media in campaigns against Wollongong City Council. vi IAP2 - International Association for Public Participation. ICAC - Independent Commission Against Corruption, a statutory investigative body of the New South Wales government. ILGRP - Independent Local Government Review Panel, a body established by the New South Wales Government to inform the local government reform process. IPRG - Integrated Planning and Reporting Guidelines, a package of tools developed by the Office of Local Government to assist local government authorities to meet their legislated responsibilities. LAP - Land Application Maps, part of the Local Environment Plans produced by councils in New South Wales. LEP - Local Environment(al) Plan, a series of legislatively mandated documents produced by councils in New South Wales. LGA - local government area (sometimes local government authority), a statutory geographic area governed by a local government authority. NSW - New South Wales, a state of Australia. OLG - Office of Local Government, an authority of the New South Wales Government (previously known as Division/Department of Local Government). PSPL - Public Spaces, Public Life, a large scale study undertaken by Gehl Architects in cities around the world, including Wollongong. QLD - Queensland, a state of Australia. vii RER - reciprocated edge ratio, a way of measuring the similarity between given user accounts as part of a social network analysis. SNA - social network analysis. SNS - social network site(s)/service(s). See social media. SWAG - Stop Wilton Airport Group, a residents’ action group active in various forums campaigning against the establishment of an international airport at Wilton in the Wollondilly Shire. TAFE - an institute of Technical and Further Education. viii Glossary actant/actor – from Latour (1987): “whoever and whatever is represented” (p. 84); and “something that acts or to which activity is granted by others” (1998, cited in Mitew, 2014, p. 14). council - generally, any local government authority (especially in Australia), or the elected body governing such an authority. e-government - electronic government, a model for delivery of government services, typically using the internet or other networked technologies such as mobile phones. enframing – enclosing human behaviour within a technological framework, or for the purposes of technology. From Heidegger (1977): “Enframing means that way of revealing which holds sway in the essence of modern technology and which is itself nothing technological” (p. 10). imaginaries – ideas conveyed in media or language. In particular, ideas about what a place is, at essence. local government – the lower of three tiers of government in Australia; an authority of state governments with responsibility for local roads, garbage collection, and civic amenities such as parks and libraries. See also council. media – prostheses that allow us to sense the world beyond what is immediately at hand. media ecosystem/s – from Scolari (2012): “a network of technologies, producers, consumers, and social forces” (p. 219). ix network – from Latour (2011): “the notion of networks points to a transformation in the way action is located and allocated. What was invisible becomes visible, what had seemed self-contained is now widely redistributed” (p. 797-798). participation – from Vromen (2003): “acts that can occur, either individually or collectively, that are intrinsically concerned with shaping the society we want to live in” (p. 82-3). participatory media – media that enframe certain types of participatory behaviour. place - a social achievement arising from networks of associations and experience in which a variety of actants compete for the primacy of their imaginaries; not merely geographic location. politics of place – the negotiation of place imaginaries among networks of heterogeneous people, objects and connections which interact constantly to produce and reproduce new configurations and imaginaries. public/s – groups of heterogeneous individuals which considers publics which arise within a shared architectures of communication and gather around thing-objects. social media - any digital media which allows users to establish profiles and connect with other users through either reciprocal or unidirectional relationships. These are typically profile- and timeline-based posting and connection technologies such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn. x List of Tables, Figures, Illustrations Figure 1: The Southern Highlands ........................................................................................xviii Figure 2: Three local government areas in New South
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