The effects of third places on individuals, organizations and territories.

Third places are shared spaces where people can work, distinct from their home (first place) and traditional workplace (second place). Third places include a range of spatial devices from cafes, bars, community centres, and public libraries to various types of collaborative spaces, such as coworking spaces or marker spaces among others (Mariotti, Tomaz, Micek, & Mendez-Ortega, 2024), which represent the heart of a community’s social vitality, conviviality, and inclusion dynamics (Oldenburg, 1997; Migliore, Manzini-Ceinar & Tagliaro, 2021). People in third places can work alone, independently from each other (Spinuzzi, 2012), or they can freely engage in various types of collaborations with other users (Garrett, Spreitzer & Bacevice, 2017). These places promote interactions between users, such as social networking, professional collaborations, brainstorming or innovative activities, joint learning exercises, and other professional and personal development activities. In the past decade, third places became an alternative solution within the context of the digital revolution and the rise of the sharing economy. They are popular among a wide range of individuals, including remote workers, students, freelancers, digital nomads, small business owners and companies, that prefer to establish their branches or satellite offices in vibrant places (Mariotti, Di Marino & Bednar, 2023). Also, third places can be found in the cities’ central business districts, as well as in peripheral and even rural and inner areas. This chapter presents the direct and indirect effects of third places as they were analyzed in fouryear research conducted by scholars involved in the European-funded COST Action CA18214 project involving more than 30 countries: “The geography of new working spaces and the impact on the periphery” 22. After a literature review, the identified effects of third places were discussed in a European Workshop held in Brussels on February 5th, 2024, with the aim of exploring opportunities for policy development.23 The workshop brought together 40 participants representing different stakeholders, including scholars, public administrators, and practitioners. In the next section, we will present the results of the dialogue among these different stakeholders.