Engagement in Placemaking: an Introduction

As underlined by Aelbrecht and Arefi (2024), despite its popularity, “placemaking” remains a nebulous concept within the public realm, given the lack of consensus on its definitions, as well as challenges in rationalising and operationalising it (Arefi, 2014; Ellery et al., 2021). Cohen et al. (2018, p. 9) suggests the “somewhat-nebulous term affords different meanings to different practitioners, professionals and academics”. In other words, in the opinion of Schrag and McKinnon (2023), it can be said that different stakeholders interpret the varying definitions as it suits their personal circumstances best (Markusen & Gadwa Nicodemus, 2014; Kobersmith, 2021).