Marca territorial como produto cultural no âmbito do desenvolvimento regional : o caso de Porto Alegre, RS, Brasil.

Abstract

The relationship between brands and territories was investigated, comprehending the integrality of the process of producing a territorial brand and the relations established with its territory. The productive process is not limited to the process of brand creation, but it is a question of investigating a variety of factors that emanate from the brands applied to the territories. Place branding is a process that creates and manages the reputation and perception of places in distinct space cuts, using an identity that elaborates a set of central ideas. The use of brands in territories has been recurrent in the last thirty years, and can be considered a global trend. When one makes use of a territorial brand, perceptions are created, a certain competition is created, and at the same time, power relations are evidenced that are crossed by symbolic disputes of identity and image of the territories. It is questioned: how did the production process of the Porto Alegre Multicity brand take place in its relation with the porto-alegrense territory? In this way, the general objective was to understand how the production process of the brand Porto Alegre Multicity in its relation with the territory portoalegrense took place. The work was anchored in cultural studies and studies on the territory, using the Cultural Circuit of Paul Du Gay et. al. (1997) as methodological protocol. The application of this circuit allowed us to deepen the productive process of the territorial brand based on five axes: production, identity, representation, regulation and consumption. In order to reach the proposed objective, the research was carried out in: pointing out the actors who created the Porto Alegre Multicity brand and the power relations existing in the process; understand the territorialities that the brand carries over the city; to verify whether or not the mark had its construction based on the precepts of place branding; identify the identities about the city that the brand has triggered and the representations it sought to build; to interpret to whom was destined the brand Porto Alegre Multicity and; propose a concept of a territorial brand in the light of Regional Development. The research brought the cultural approach within the scope of Regional Development, investigating the theme of territorial brands that crossed also the understanding of concepts such as: territory, territorialities and theory of cultural studies and urban studies. It was verified the articulation of representations, territorial identities and power relations centered on the territorial brand, taking it as a social and symbolic construction of the social actors and as a cultural artifact. Its emergence points to the presence of a symbolic market, the territorial, identifying the presence of three large groups of actors. Some identities and representations were triggered on the mark, revealing the need to create a new identity for Porto Alegre. The proposal of territorial brand approach, associating the field of studies of branding with that of Regional Development, with its theoretical and methodological references, can be taken for research in the scope of Regional Development. Likewise, the methodological proposal of study through the Culture Circuit, as well as research methodology, can be adjusted in social intervention projects, being a driver to promote or measure the construction of the brand in relation to the territory. The concept of territorial brand in view of the cultural approach of Regional Development refers to the creation of symbolic value, the articulation of actors, the plurality of identities present in a territory, creating strategies that make it a significant asset for the territory and, consequently, for the region.