Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.5673/sip.62.2.1
Capital Zagreb Versus Coastal Split: Enduring Tensions Between Capital Cities and Port Second Cities
Godfrey Baldacchino
orcid.org/0000-0001-7994-1767
; University of Malta, Malta
Tomislav Oroz
orcid.org/0000-0002-1645-7254
; University of Zadar, Croatia
Anica Čuka
; University of Zadar, Croatia
Abstract
Being on the edge of space and politics, coastal cities (sometimes accompanied
by islands) traditionally play second fiddle to larger, urban capital cities, located more centrally
in their respective countries’ interiors. This paper aims to explore the opportunities and threats
faced by coastal cities and their neighbouring islands while rethinking them through the concept
of ‘the second city’. Today, the status of second(ary) cities is usually constituted in terms
of their size, resources, economic, and political power. In the context of maritime second (and
secondary) cities, these criteria are further complicated by their peripheral status and 'marginal'
role. However, this generic understanding of second(ary) cities is being challenged, thereby
enabling much more complex definitions and a multidisciplinary approach. This paper offers
a rethinking of how ‘the second city’ is understood, by analysing the multi-layered relations
and ambivalences emerging from the entanglement of historical, cultural, social and economic
processes that define coastal cities as second cities. Based on a combination of desk research,
discourse analysis of secondary literature and the authors’ multi-disciplinarity, experiences and
presence in the cities they study, the focus is on how a city’s secondness is experienced, negotiated and redefined. After a short but scene-setting overview of first/second city cases and their
associated problems, the study engages with the coastal city of Split as Croatia’s second city in
relation to the (non-coastal) capital, Zagreb. Our aim is to understand what constitutes Split as
second city, and how the coastal experience and the cosmopolitan vibe of Mediterranean Split
triggers social and cultural processes in which secondness is questioned and (re)negotiated. Furthermore,
we want to understand how does the changing (in)visibility of Split’s urban seascape
challenge and override its stigma as Croatia’s ‘second best’ urban settlement.
Keywords
capital cities; Croatia; maritimity; port cities; second cities; Split; Zagreb
Hrčak ID:
321014
URI
Publication date:
30.9.2024.
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