Urban Economics and Planning

Urban Economics and Planning

Studying the Revival of Handicrafts in the Local Urban Economy (Case Study: Mesgarha Street, Zanjan City)

Document Type : Original Article

Authors
Sima Ghayebloo 1
Alireza Daviran 2
1 Assistant Professor, Department of Geography Education, Farhangian University of Tehran, Iran
2 Assistant Professor, Department of Industrial Engineering, Zanjan University, Zanjan, Iran
10.22034/uep.2024.472013.1526
Abstract
Introduction 
In the new economic system, the place of production is separated from the place of sale, creating a more coherent structure. This is important in handicrafts; it works differently, and the place of purchase and production is usually the same. Meanwhile, the urban axes, especially the central axes of the city, are the places of production and sale of handicrafts according to the type of function. The economic function of urban axes in the handicraft sector gradually finds a specific pattern, and the organization finds its function. The old urban centers with traditional activities (handicrafts), which have become worn out and functionally decayed over time, have been revived with revitalization programs and are accepting an active functional structure. A function that seeks to renew its past identity with a contemporary approach while reconstructing the economic life of the past welcomes tourists as well. This research aims to investigate the effect of the revitalization of the historical-identity axes of the city with a handicraft approach to the role of handicraft revival in the development of the local economy of urban axes. Therefore, the research question is how the reconstruction of handicrafts in the historical axes of the city has led to the prosperity of the urban economy. What are the challenges of an urban economy based on handicrafts in historical axes, and what are its development strategies?
Materials and Methods
The current research approach is qualitative-inductive research based on the interpretive phenomenological method that uses the database approach. Data collection was done using semi-structured and unstructured interview tools. The geographical unit of the research includes guilds related to copperware industries located in Mesgarha Street, Zanjan City. The social unit of the research includes the activists of the above-mentioned copperware industries. The data was based on purposeful and theoretical sampling, including 24 activists located on Mesgarha Street (Tawheed). Data analysis has been done in an inductive interpretative way (from part to whole) in the database model. First, the data was open-coded (650 codes) and reduced by merging common and similar codes, then by axial coding, and finally by selective coding, categories, and main concepts were extracted. In such a process, the pattern model resulting from causal, contextual, intervening, strategic, and finally consequential conditions was drawn and explained.
Findings
The analysis of the database showed that the main concepts of services and facilities, product branding, and physical quality are the determining foundations in the local economy based on copper crafts in Zanjan’s copper mines axis, which functions in connection with the urban space of the central fabric of the city. Causal, contextual factors, and mediating and strategic conditions in the structures of strength, active challenge, obstacle, and retardation in the mobility and dynamism of the local economy or, contrary to it, have been influential in the process of revitalization and revitalization of the local economy based on handicrafts. The results of the database process in terms of the consequences of the model show that the branding of Zanjan copper handicrafts and its support with the presence of young people, educated people, and tourists will boost the local economy with a positive result, and the other hand, inappropriate spatial organization, inappropriate physical quality and services, the issue of authenticity. Acceptability of goods, the negative and two-sided mentality of artisans, and urban management have been among the negative consequences affecting the reconstruction of an economy based on handicrafts in the central axes of the city. To improve the structure of the said axis and accelerate the reconstruction of the said axis in the Mesgarha axis, it is suggested that urban management about the physical structure of the axis and the surrounding tissue implement more targeted operational and practical programs and by changing the intellectual and mental management procedure, the negative consequences to positive consequences to make it functional. The basic requirement is to prepare local and thematic plans for fabric restoration (by the structural and functional identity).
Conclusion
The active consequences of the reconstruction of handicrafts based on copper smithing in the said street due to the branding of Zanjan copper handicrafts and its support with the presence of young people, educated people, tourists, the boom of the local economy, and the other hand, inappropriate spatial organization, inappropriate physical quality and services, product authenticity The negative and two-sided mentality of artisans and urban management has been among the negative factors affecting the reconstruction of the handicraft-based economy in the central axes of the city.
Keywords
Consequential Conditions
Copper Mining
Local Economy
Revitalization
Zanjan

Subjects

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Urban Economics and Planning
Volume 5, Issue 3
Summer 2024
Pages 106-122

  • Receive Date 06 August 2024
  • Revise Date 14 September 2024
  • Accept Date 19 September 2024