Visual Vandalism: Marginal Communication in the Megapolis

A distinctive feature of a resident of a modern megapolis is the desire not just to live, but to participate in its management. A modern citizen is someone who has the right to the city and has the opportunity to implement it. Today, a citizen is deprived of this right, it is privatized by officials and local governments, as a result of which, a citizen turns out to be an outcast, alienated from the megapolis. But it is important for a modern person to be the master of his life, which encourages him to take actions to restore the right to the city, which determines the relevance of this study. In this regard, the aim of this work is to analyze the power-citizen communication and ways to activate it. For this purpose, the effectiveness of local self-government and various forms of visual vandalism were analyzed as a way of appropriating urban space and one of the options for attracting attention to the quality of communication between citizens and the authorities. The main research methods were trendwatching, semantic analysis of vandal images and texts, and regulatory analysis of legislation regulating the activities of local governments and acts of vandal behavior. Yekaterinburg acted as the empirical base of the study. During the study, two main areas of communication between citizens and municipal authorities were identified, this is a socio-political direction, including demographic problems, political experiences, problems of prices, road quality and others, and a cultural one, including a religious aspect, raising issues related to education, the fight against COVID-19, religious conflicts, etc. The results of the study were conclusions about the insufficient effectiveness of the activities of local self-government bodies; the low level of involvement of citizens in local self-government; the fact that residents of the megapolis are looking for ways to establish communication with municipal authorities; communication established by residents is marginal and is embodied in the form of vandal activity.