ABSTRACT This thesis explores change in place, and particularly the social tensions that arise from change in peri-urban communities. In this study, a review of relevant literature indicates that rural/urban fringe areas are dynamic places, as pressure for the conversion of rural land uses to rural residential function creates social and economic anxiety. With pressure for change, tensions between people, both inside and outside of the local community become more clearly articulated, as change for some members of the community is an un-welcomed progression. Others, who may have no association with the local community, grasp the opportunity for change, particularly if financial return is the end reward. This study considers various approaches to the analysis of these changes in place and develops a methodology that reveals the social dimension of change, and more particularly the tensions associated with shifting land use patterns and changing demographic characteristics in the peri-urban location of Matangi.

This master thesis aims to contribute to the available literature on how place branding can be used for enhancing local identity and how this affects audience participation, in particular: engagement on social media. The case of two campaigns of the Swedish cooperative bank Länsförsäkringar are used to demonstrate the initial hypothesis: local identity and place branding use in campaigns as part of a corporate branding strategy increases followers’ engagement and participation on social media. To that end, essential theoretical concepts in order to understand the research approach and methods are explained in the following sections. For this thesis, the encoding/decoding theory by Stuart Hall is used as theoretical framework, along with some other key theoretical aspects such as identity theory, globalization and place branding.Two different campaigns of Länsförsäkringar are analysed following a mixed approach by carrying out a visual semiotic analysis of the materials (mainly photographies, posters or videos) with an autoethnographic and constructivist perspective, and a social media analysis by looking at the engagement that those campaigns generated on Länsförsäkringar’s social media. The findings show that the use of local identities and local place branding as a corporate branding strategy impacts positively on some types of social media engagement by appealing to the online community’s common origin, heritage and geography.