Capturing public space and attitudes towards them on the forums of NGS.ru

The article is devoted to the widespread but insufficiently studied social phenomenon in modern Russia that is capture or seizure of public space. The author shows the case studies of the concept of capture in relation to different social objects and indicates its key elements and common features. The seizure of public space is defined as an illegitimate restriction of its general openness and accessibility carried out for private purposes. Using the method of content analysis, the author studies the attitude of visitors to the NGS.ru site to various situations of capturing public space in the city of Novosibirsk. It is concluded that the content of the discussion of these situations makes it possible to classify them as the problems of sociological study on the elite capture of public good and resources, land grabbing as a type of new fencing and privatization of public space.