The third place facing the challenges of its own success: Toward the formation of a civic-market compromise in the making of the city

In this article, we explore the strong interest in third places—which originated from countercultural movements such as the hacker movement—among institutions and local authorities as well as large real estate companies. In order to understand its success, we propose, based on the sociology of justification, to understand the third place as a support point for the construction of a civic-market compromise in the making of the city. This compromise makes it possible to respond to two opposing processes—the difficulties of financing urban public policies and the rise in the threats of contestation of large urban projects—by transferring these socioeconomic risks from public actors to private actors. For our demonstration, we will rely on a survey of entrepreneurs involved in the construction and consolidation of this civic-market compromise.