University of Belgrade – Faculty of Philosophy │ 2019 E xperiencing Postsocialist Capitalism: Urban Changes and Challenges in Serbia Edited by: EJelisaveta Petrović and Vera Backović Experiencing Postsocialist Capitalism: Urban Changes and Challenges in Serbia Edited by: Jelisaveta Petrović and Vera Backović First Edition, Belgrade 2019. Publisher University of Belgrade – Faculty of Philosophy Institute for Sociological Research Čika Ljubina 18–20, Belgrade 11000, Serbia www.f.bg.ac.rs For publisher Prof. dr Miomir Despotović Reviewers Ana Birešev Faculty of Philosophy – University of Belgrade, Serbia Anđelina Svirčić Gotovac Institute for Social Research in Zagreb, Croatia Drago Kos Faculty of Social Sciences – University of Ljubljana, Slovenia Mina Petrović Faculty of Philosophy – University of Belgrade, Serbia Vuk Vuković Faculty of Dramatic Arts – University of Montenegro, Montenegro Proofreader Ivan Kovanović Pre-press Dosije studio, Belgrade Printing JP Službeni glasnik, Belgrade Print run 200 copies ISBN 978-86-6427-136-3 This edited volume results from the project “Challenges of New Social Integration in Serbia: Concepts and Actors” (Project No. 179035), supported by the Serbian Ministry of Education, Scientific Research and Technological Development. CONTENTS 7 | List of Contributors 9 | Acknowledgements 11 | Jelisaveta Petrović and Vera Backović Introduction PART I: NEOLIBERALIZED SOCIO-SPATIAL TRANSFORMATIONS 23 | Vera Backović The Specificity of Gentrification in the Postsocialist City: The Case of the Belgrade Waterfront Project 45 | Jorn Koelemaij and Stefan Janković Behind the Frontline of the Belgrade Waterfront: A Reconstruction of the Early Implementation Phase of a Transnational Real Estate Development Project 67 | Barend Wind Socio-Spatial Inequalities in the Housing Market: The Outcomes of Belgrade’s Socialist and Postsocialist Policy Regime 105 | Ivana Spasić The Symbolic Markers of Belgrade’s Transformation: Monuments and Fountains 127 | Ana Pajvančić – Cizelj Struggling with the Title: A Capital of Culture at the Superperiphery of Europe PART II: URBAN (RE)ACTIONS: AWAKENING OF URBAN MOVEMENTS 151 | Jelena Božilović Right to the City: Urban Movements and Initiatives as the Pulse of Civil Society in Serbia 6 | Experiencing Postsocialist Capitalism: Urban Changes and Challenges in Serbia 171 | Jelisaveta Petrović The Transformative Power of Urban Movements on the European Periphery: The Case of the Don’t Let Belgrade D(r)own Initiative 189 | Mladen Nikolić The Participants in the Protest Against Illegal Demolitions in Belgrade’s Savamala Quarter 211 | Selena Lazić The Role of the Civil Sector in the Urban Transformation of the Savamala Neighbourhood 229 | Marina Čabrilo Brushing over Urban Space: Between the Struggle for the Right to the City and the Reproduction of the Neoliberal Model through the Example of Belgrade Murals and Graffiti LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS Ana Pajvančić – Cizelj – Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad, Serbia Barend Wind – Department of Spatial Planning and Environment, Uni- versity of Groningen, Netherlands Ivana Spasić – Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Jelena Božilović – Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, Uni- versity of Niš, Serbia Jelisaveta Petrović – Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Jorn Koelemaij – Department of Geography, Ghent University, Belgium Marina Č abrilo – Master’s student, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Mladen Nikolić – Master of Sociology, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Selena Lazić – PhD candidate, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Phi- losophy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Stefan Janković – Institute for Sociological Research, Faculty of Philoso- phy, University of Belgrade, Serbia Vera Backović – Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, Univer- sity of Belgrade, Serbia | 9 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The idea to prepare an edited volume that deals with the socio-spatial transformation of cities in Serbia arose from the dramatic changes to ur- ban space caused by the Belgrade Waterfront megaproject and the bitter reactions to it by ordinary citizens gathered around the Don’t Let Belgrade D(r)own initiative. We were further encouraged to implement the project by several excellent undergraduate and Master’s theses covering the topic of Belgrade’s transformation from various angles, that were presented at the Department of Sociology from 2016 to 2018 at thesis committees in which we participated. The initial idea was to produce a volume of student papers, however, due to the importance of the topic and interest expressed by both the local academic community and the wider public in the topic of urban change, we determined that a greater level of attention should be devoted to this issue. Therefore, in addition to professors and associate professors from the Department of Sociology of the Belgrade Faculty of Philosophy, this volume has also gathered together papers by those re- searching urban phenomena at other Serbian universities (Novi Sad and Niš), as well as those from Belgium and the Netherlands. Though the ini- tial focus was to be on Belgrade’s socio-spatial transformation, this was extended to include two other major Serbian cities – Novi Sad and Niš – which are also experiencing intensive social-spatial changes. The end result is that this volume grew from its original, relatively modest concep- tion, into an international publication that we believe is fitting for a topic of such significance and with such far-reaching consequences. Our ideas would certainly not have been met with fruition without the institutional support of the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Bel- grade and the “Challenges of New Social Integration in Serbia” project, from which this volume was developed. Particularly indispensable were the head of the project, Professor Mladen Lazić, and Professor Mina Petrović, who headed the sub-project, Territorial Capital in Serbia: Struc- tural and Action Potential of Local Development, as well as other col- leagues who accepted the invitation to participate in authoring the study. We owe special thanks to Professor Mina Petrović, Faculty of Phi- losophy, University of Belgrade, who in her role as reviewer, but also as an advisor, greatly contributed to the quality of this volume. We are also very grateful to our other reviewers: Drago Kos, Associate Professor at the 10 | Experiencing Postsocialist Capitalism: Urban Changes and Challenges in Serbia Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Ljubljana; Anđelina Svirčić Go- tovac, Senior Research Associate, Institute for Social Research in Zagreb; Vuk Vuković, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Dramatic Arts, University of Montenegro; and Ana Birešev, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade. Their suggestions were a significant contribution to the overall quality of the papers presented in this volume. We would like to take this opportunity to also extend our thanks to Assistant Professor Jelena Pešić from the Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy, Uni- versity of Belgrade, for her useful advice that helped us select an appropri- ate title for the volume. Finally, we would like to thank Milena Toković, a researcher at the Institute for Sociological Research, for her administrative support on this project, as well as our proofreader, Ivan Kovanović, for his dedicated contribution to the linguistic quality of the texts. Belgrade, 29 October 2019 | 11 INTRODUCTION Jelisaveta Petrović and Vera Backović The aim of this volume is to explore current urban developments in Serbia, a former Yugoslav country, three decades after socialism. At the very outset, we should say that as editors of this volume we had a dif- ficult time in settling on an appropriate title for the book. The dilemma emerged from a question that burdens current scholarship on postsocial- ist cities: thirty years after socialism does the term “postsocialist city” still adequately describe ongoing urban processes? Indeed, for some authors “the “post-socialist city” reflects a regrettable lack of forward-looking imagina- tion” (Hirt et al., 2016: 5). Others stress its contested nature that is im- posed by a developmental paradigm, as it tends to represent something delayed, atypical, and even abnormal (Ferenčuhova & Gentile, 2017). Therefore, the concept is often deemed inappropriate because it reinforces the “otherness” of non-western societies (Ferenčuhova & Gentile, 2017). The concept has also met with criticism for being obsolete, for referring to a vanishing object, for falling into a territorial trap and for constrain- ing political futures (Muller, 2019: 533; Humphrey, 2002; Hirt, 2013; Ferenčuhova, 2016; Hirt et al., 2017). These drawbacks even prompted Martin Muller to write a farewell to postsocialism (Muller, 2019). This is, however, not the first time East European scholars thought it was time to say goodbye to postsocialism and consign it to the dustbin of urban studies history. Similar attempts were made at the beginning of the 21st century (Humphrey, 2002), then again when some of the postsocialist states joined the European Union and then once more in the wake of the twentieth anniversary of the events of 1989 (Stenning & Horschelmann, 2008: 312). Despite these claims that the time has come to replace this obsolete concept with something fresh and theoretically