Archinect - The Soft City

Part 1 of 2: Is neoliberal capitalism the right model to shape our future cities?

2014-01-06T18:11:57-05:00

“It has come to us from a dystopia where the rulers of the world pass their lives in glass towers away from the mean streets. Down there the excluded loot and burn, and the sky-dwellers profess to be shocked by their lack of morality.”

Jonathan Jones (Journalist)

The next two blog posts will explore the economic realm in which architecture and urban design current dwell. This first post will look more widely at the concept of neoliberalism in our economy, with the second concentrating on its relationship to the city.

The economic system subscribed to by much of the western world is 'neoliberal capitalism'. A core element of neoliberal capitalism is a free and self regulating market. Campaigners for this capitalist personality advocate the nature of a free market system will self regulate and be a highly effective generators of wealth. This premise taken in isolation is correct. If you take away the regulations that protect workers' rights to a minimum wage or the right t...

Intuition and Instinct

2013-06-24T17:35:00-04:00

This post will focus upon some issues raised in a BBC Radio 4 episode of In Our Time (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00rfhx2), looking at the driving forces and ideology behind the creation of cities. For those that can't access the audio material due to licensing restrictions, the discussion within the show charts the history of the City. The academic guests explore a story which lead to people congregating in settlements of increasing size and complexity. Factors such as agriculture, commerce, the exploitation of resources and the need for collective protection feature in their reasoning. I wish to explore a subject highlighted by Julia Merritt (approximately 10 minutes 30 seconds into episode). She looks at a time when cities start to have a sense of themselves, an understanding of what they are and their possible purpose. By that, I mean people begin to observe and write about the cities they occupy and critically reflect upon their experience. Merritt analyses a du...

In The Beginning

2013-05-16T18:23:27-04:00

Since completing my postgraduate degree, I've been looking for a way to continue exploring the themes I touched upon during my time at university. The role of the blog is to act as a pensive for my ideas and experiences within architecture and its relating fields. The name of the blog was also the title for my final thesis. Both are inspired by a book - Soft City - from the author Jonathan Raban. I was drawn to one quote in particular.

“In the moment of new beginnings, the city goes soft: it awaits the imprint of an identity. For better or worse it asks you to remake it, to consolidate it into a shape you can live in. You, too. Decide who you are, and the city will again assume a fixed form around you. Decide what it is, and your own identity will be revealed, like a position on a map fixed by triangulation. Cities unlike villages and small towns, are plastic in nature. We mould them in our own images: they, in their turn, shape us by the resistance they offer when we try an...