Urban Theory

Abstract (English)
The modernist concept of life-building as an architectural method for improving the conditions of everyday life originated in Europe during the 1920s. This book explores three modes of functionalism by way of a comparative analysis of both the theoretical discourses and architectural practices associated with functionalism in Russia, Germany, and Sweden. These three countries made significant contributions to the application of functionalism within mass housing construction, the overarching purpose of which was to transform the traditional home into a rational living space.

This study provides both close readings of foundational modernist texts as well as an empirical study of the avant-garde heritage in Russia, Germany, and Sweden. As a special case study, a visual analysis of IKEA catalogues is presented, the purpose of which is to provide an illustrated history of modernist aesthetics within mass-produced living spaces, from the era of functionalism up to the present day.

Abstract (Svenska)
Det modernistiska begreppet livsbyggande, som en arkitektonisk metod för att förbättra vardagslivets villkor, uppstod i Europa under 1920-talet. Denna bok undersöker tre former av funktionalism via en komparativ analys av teoretiska diskurser såväl som arkitekturpraktiker i Ryssland, Tyskland och Sverige. Dessa tre länder gjorde viktiga bidrag till funktionalismens tillämpning inom storskalig bostadsproduktion, med det övergripande syftet att förvandla det traditionella hemmet till en rationell bostad.

Denna studie innehåller både närläsningar av grundläggande teoretiska texter inom modernismen och en empirisk studie av avantgardets arv i Ryssland, Tyskland och Sverige. En speciell fallstudie utgörs av en bildanalys av IKEA:s kataloger, med syftet att ge en historia i bild av modernismens estetik inom storskalig bostadsproduktion från funktionalismen till idag.

Este trabalho pretende discutir o urbanismo como estrategia de poder na sociedade denominada do espetaculo. Desde o segundo pos-guerra, com a reorganizacao das forcas geopoliticas no Ocidente, a cidade tem se tornado parte do espetaculo em suas mais reconhecidas formas. Ao urbanismo coube, como disciplina, a ordenacao fisica do ambiente material, e a ele foi dado exercer determinada forma de controle cujo desempenho configura parte fundamental na arquitetura do poder espetacular.

This paper discusses processes involved in the transformation of Águas Claras’ materiality, a neighborhood designed in Brasília, Federal District, whose project aspired to mimic the streets and the avenues with wide sidewalks typical of the so-called “traditional cities” as opposed to the modernist urban model – ample green spaces, roads separated from pedestrian flows and isolated buildings – that characterizes the Pilot Plan of Brasília, located only 19 kilometers from the analyzed site. In addition to the criticism established about Brasília as urban subject, Águas Claras is characterized as a break in the metropolitan landscape of the region, previously marked by the horizontality of its satellite cities and by the disperse occupation of the territory. The intense verticalization, much higher than the 12 floors initially foreseen in Paulo Zimbres’ design contracted in 1991, configures walled blocks as small closed condominiums, despite the premises of profuse public spaces in hi...

Cabe evidenciar duas contribuições metodológicas da ritmanálise de Henri Lefebvre para o problema de como sociedade se transforma pela mediação de práticas sociais que se (re)produzem nos e através dos objetos e espaços mais ou menos tecnológicos que povoam a vida cotidiana em cidades impactadas pela possibilidade da modernidade. Elucidarei primeiramente a ritmanálise, e sua articulação com o pensamento lefebvriano. Virá à tona então a peculiaridade teórica de meu argumento, cuja pertinência empírica demonstrarei brevemente na sequência. Recorrendo a dados fotográficos e etnográficos de minha pesquisa sobre as ruas e praças públicas do perímetro historicamente mais antigo da São Paulo atual (Frehse, 2011), demonstrarei o que corpos humanos que passam ou se deixam ficar fisicamente com regularidade ali revelam sobre o ritmo das mudanças socioculturais nessa megacidade atualmente – e, assim, sobre a ritmanálise como via de apreensão empírica de indícios da mudança social possível na v...

This critical introduction to the special issue examines the place and significance of urban modernity as a concept in contemporary urban studies. It draws on postcolonial theory to demonstrate that the relation between the city and modernity developed within the western tradition of urban thinking has produced a geographically and historically uneven conceptualisation of urban modernity. This conceptualisation not only involves dynamics of othering, in which cities are differentiated hierarchically, but also obscures a vast array of possible understandings of contemporary urban living. The aim of this introduction is to question this way of thinking about urban modernity in light of globalisation and 21st-century transformations of urban space. It argues that it is crucial, now more than ever, to render the concept of urban modernity attentive to the lived experience of contemporary cities worldwide.

Urban Space is not just a simple, physical configuration. Instead, it is a transformation of human experiences with the different synchronic architectural characteristic that needs a critical examination to segregate discrete layers of structural elements. As a result, the traditional urban space is a unique existence of reality; it is a product of prolonged interaction between society and architecture. Neglecting any part in the public space perception process is leading to crash the binary equation letting the meaning paralyzed without being able to represent any society or potentially keep the sense. There are many examples of worn-out urban spaces some of them was a result of ignorance and absent of realization of the interaction between Society and architecture.The Iraqi municipality demolished that relationship by importing different layers that are not compatible with the original one or as a result of inserting new means of technology in the heart of the historic cities. The...

Underground resources are often addressed only out of necessity, leading to conflicts between uses and missing opportunities for productive synergies. The Deep City project is exploring a paradigm of ‘resources to needs’, which considers resource potentials prior to specific urban projects or plans. Mapping is central to the project and has been explored in several cities around the world. The ‘resources to needs’ paradigm, however, has received little theoretical or philosophical attention. To think resources before needs challenges common urban normative models and the process-oriented thinking of mechanical and ecological paradigms popular today. Where current methods for mapping the underground tend to enroll elements in a particular performance or resource use, Deep City seeks to facilitate an intermediate stage in which resource potentials can coexist without any pre-existing interaction or relationship. To think about the urban volume this way, this article works with the inf...

This paper looks at the process of incorporation of distinct socio-spatial qualities in three neighborhoods of Tokyo to retheorize the concept of 'differences'. Lefebvre's idea of recuperation and Raymond Williams' interpretation of incorporation serve as a basis to develop a conceptual framework to analyze this process beyond existing concepts of gentrification and urban renewal. Central as well as peripheral urban areas are undergoing drastic transformation: residential patterns are changing, commercial areas are expanding and the force of gravity of the central urban areas is reaching over the territory. In cities like Tokyo, Mexico City, and Los Angeles this has led to an urban restructuring and reinterpretation of neighborhoods which has produced an alienation and incorporation of existing livelihoods and practices into an imposed and commodified perception of urban space. Constrained by concepts of neighborhood transformation or singular case studies present studies have not been able to capture these processes in Tokyo. In this paper I developed a new conceptual approach in order to adequately describe and situate these contemporary transformation processes within the larger urban context and existing socio-economic and political dynamics. In so doing I propose the concept of 'incorporation of urban differences' that allows to capture the analyzed process of transformation across different contexts, different historical trajectories, and their relation to centralities. Incorporation of urban differences emerges from a coherent understanding of urbanization processes within a certain region and around the world, resulting from a comparative research framework within which this study is placed.

This paper discusses processes involved in the transformation of Águas Claras’ materiality, a neighborhood designed in Brasília, Federal District, whose project aspired to mimic the streets and the avenues with wide sidewalks typical of the so-called “traditional cities” as opposed to the modernist urban model – ample green spaces, roads separated from pedestrian flows and isolated buildings – that characterizes the Pilot Plan of Brasília, located only 19 kilometers from the analyzed site. In addition to the criticism established about Brasília as urban subject, Águas Claras is characterized as a break in the metropolitan landscape of the region, previously marked by the horizontality of its satellite cities and by the disperse occupation of the territory. The intense verticalization, much higher than the 12 floors initially foreseen in Paulo Zimbres’ design contracted in 1991, configures walled blocks as small closed condominiums, despite the premises of profuse public spaces in hi...

In this article, we discuss the concept of territory from a decolonized perspective. We engage with the ongoing debate on decentralizing urban studies to outline the potential drawbacks of essentializing, generalizing or objectifying the urban. Through the socio-territorial approach utilized here we seek to address these issues by shifting attention, first, to the social production of territory, and secondly, from an analysis of state strategies to the urban scale. We understand territory as being produced when subjects struggle over the practices, meanings and tenures of urban space. An example from Mexico City is employed to illustrate how territory becomes both the site and stake of social struggle. By focusing on the subjects involved in the production of territory, and on the way different subjects produce and reproduce hegemonic spaces and counter-spaces, we emphasize three aspects in particular: first, a territory's specific material conditions; secondly, the imaginarios (social imaginaries) various actors inscribe into it; and thirdly, the communal land use form of the ejido as a unique territorial regulation. Finally, we argue for the empirical groundedness of the concept of territory with the aim of further pluralizing the field of urban studies. The socio-territorial approach we propose explicitly focuses on power relations in the production of both urban space and knowledge.

Cet article discute de la mobilisation de la notion de droit a la ville dans les Suds en echo aux debats sur le Southern turn. Il analyse les difficultes qui entourent l’incorporation, dans ces contextes postcoloniaux, de certains elements de ces debats, tels qu’ils sont poses d’une part par les auteurs neomarxistes du Nord responsables de la reactivation de la notion lefebvrienne au debut des annees 2000, d’autre part dans les travaux sur le developpement. Il revient ainsi sur l’apport des villes dites du Sud, et particulierement celles d’Afrique subsaharienne, aux debats sur le droit a la ville et sur la place qu’occupent ces villes dans ce dernier. Il s’agit d’eclairer la maniere dont se sont construites les discussions contemporaines sur le droit a la ville afin de questionner les limites du binome analytique Sud/Nord, que ce dernier vise a denoncer la domination des Nords sur les Suds ou qu’il cherche a affirmer la specificite du Sud et le besoin de theorisation par le Sud.

The success of the campaign for a dedicated urban Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) reflected a consensus on the importance of “cities” in sustainable development. The relevance accorded to cities in the SDGs is twofold, reflected both in the specific place-based content of the Urban Goal and the more general concern with the multiple scales at which the SDGs will be monitored will be institutionalized. Divergent views of the city and urban processes, suppressed within the Urban Goal, are, however, likely to become more explicit as attention shifts to implementation. Acknowledging the different theoretical traditions used to legitimize the new urban agenda is an overdue task. As this agenda develops post-2015, the adequacy of these forms of urban theory will become more contested around, among other concerns, the possibilities and limits of place-based policy, advocacy and activism; and ways of monitoring and evaluating processes of urban transformation along multiple axes of devel...

This article is based on the premise that it is possible to apply Henri Lefebvre’s critical-theoretical apparatus to complex urban processes as a pedagogical case study. From previous knowledge of Lefebvrian thought, the article provides an overview of what Lefebvre called “the science of the use of social space”, supported by a transdisciplinary methodological plurality. The starting point is that neoliberal social space is produced, prepared, and led to the imminent urban post-neoliberalism, in the midst of this movement, a sophisticated planning system appears, with the old promise of service tradition, egalitarian ethics and pragmatic orientation. But in practice, it only reproduces the impotence of being inside a wave of localized surplus-benefits that expels human residues, avoiding any reaction. The Lefebvrian apparatus and a part of its theoretical tradition guide the research on Barcelona as a paradigm of global real-estate violence. This urban phenomenon is examined in cen...

China is undergoing an urban revolution. In 2011 more than half of the total population resided in cities and towns for the first time in history. Over the last two decades urban China scholars have actively engaged in dialogues with urbanists from different disciplines and different urban contexts. In consequence, urban China studies have embarked on a trail of rapid diversification and proliferation, moving beyond the topics of urbanisation and urban expansion to address a variety of issues echoing the latest developments in the Chinese city. Overall, urban China studies are witnessing a transition from a focus on economic development and spatial changes, to diverse social groups and the multifaceted experiences of living in rapidly changing cities. This virtual special issue (VSI) summarises the progress of urban China studies since the Economic Reform was launched in the 1970s. On the one hand, it delineates a broad picture of intellectual advancement and knowledge production in...

Abstract: World-city literature often relies on a priori assumptions rather than quantifiable measures to discern the global urban hierarchy. In search of comparable international indicators, many studies use the corporate headquarters of multinational corporations (MNCs) as primary ...

Problem statement: Over the last decades, “urbanization” has always been identified as one of the key driving forces of socio-spatial transformations across the world. However, various interpretations of mutations about this concept are not seriously discussed in accordance with its contextual and temporal characteristics. Literary equivalents such as city growth, urban becoming, city building, civilization, and urbanism have been used to cover its complex concepts in Iran. It is obvious that equivalence in any literature is a conventional and formal issue, however, it is worthwhile to separate the formal issues of words from their conceptual issues. Currently “urbanization” is rapidly evolving and becoming more dynamic. Research objective: This research tries to use the method of causal layer analysis (CLA) in four layers: (1) level of obvious and accepted, (2) level of macro-related causes, (3) level of discourse/ worldview, and (4) level of metaphor/myth. In addition to identifyi...

In this piece, we introduce a special issue on “Rethinking Urban Density” which asks: what are the meanings and implications of density in cities today? How might we understand and research it? This collection offers a set of reflections on urban density in different parts of the world. Ranging from the urban forms, lived experiences, and perceptions, to the policy trends and politics of urban density, authors in this collection explore together the dynamics and implications of urban densities in cities of the global South, East, and North. Emerging from the 2019 Rethinking Density workshop in the Department of Geography at Durham University, this evolving dialogue on urban density identifies some key debates and critical reflections on wider urban processes and futures.

Si Barcelone et Lyon etaient considerees comme des laboratoires d’amenagement d’espaces publics a la fin du XXe siecle, Copenhague est certainement l’une des villes europeennes les plus prolifiques dans le domaine a l’heure actuelle. Dans ce contexte d’emulation generale, un certain nombre de realisations marquantes ont recemment vu le jour. Largement plebiscites et publies a l’echelle internationale, ces exemples se distinguent par une grande heterogeneite dans leur expression formelle comme dans les usages qu’ils accueillent. Un element les rassemble pourtant : l’affirmation recurrente dans le discours des architectes et paysagistes qui les ont imagines d’une volonte de creer une experience par un amenagement singulier. Les espaces publics copenhagois contemporains se presenteraient ainsi comme des lieux uniques dans lesquels les usagers peuvent vivre une situation inhabituelle et eprouver des emotions memorables. Mais qu’entendent veritablement les concepteurs par la ? Et plus sp...

En el marco de la problematica integral de la investigacion doctoral del autor, el articulo muestra el primer paso en el proceso de construccion cientifica del espacio radical humano como objeto complejo de estudio en la propuesta de tesis. Desde la peculiaridad marxista de Henri Lefebvre, en tres momentos de creacion, vertebradores de toda su obra, se encontraran contribuciones novedosas al marxismo frances en particular y a la teoria critica en general, permitiendo anticipar la nocion del espacio radical humano a la etapa urbanoespacial lefebvriana (mas reconocida a partir de 1960). El autor desentrana al joven Lefebvre para empezar a desear o imaginar una sociedad urbanizada transformada, a traves de la restitucion de la dilectica de Lefebvre, su critica de la vida cotidiana y teoria de los momentos, –contribuciones germinales– situadas en tres obras poco estudiadas desde el urbanismo o las ciencias espaciales: Le Materialisme Dialectique (1939), Critique de la Vie Quotidienne I ...

This essay analyzes the spatial and temporal dynamics which have emerged from the rapid development of Chiang Mai, Thailand over the last four decades. Modern urbanization since the 1980s in the previously remote Chiang Mai-Lamphun Valley has coincided with digital and financial globalization, neo-liberal governance, and the articulation of a new geological era of the Anthropocene based on evidence of human induced climate change. This time frame serves as a lens to theorize the architecture of the “metacity”, a new urban form and new form of urban practice responding to the demands of global digital financial networks and neo-liberal trade policies, but grounded in the ecology and life worlds of particular localities. The metacity appears in Chiang Mai within the interstices of a particularly fragmented rural/urban mix within a self-organized rather than plan-controlled built environment. The entire valley has been the site of intensive inhabitation for centuries, and recently urba...

In the article an attempt has been made to analyze the specificity of urbanized areas in Japan. The intention to find non-obvious connections with European cities was the principal motif behind this research. An insight into selected processes and phenomena related to Tokyo, Kyoto, or Osaka as well as critical analysis of various researchers' opinions formed canvas to conclude with several observations concerning universal rules metropolitan areas are subject to.

This paper argues that the global impacts caused by the homogenisation and loss of identity tendencies in architecture and planning will be only overcome if recognizing them as part of the world westernization and if a decolonial attitude is promoted for leading the urban-architectural theory through “transmodernity” by means of the “ecology of knowledge” including the experiences that modern thinking marginalized. In that sense, the paper presents a critical approach based on “territorial coloniality”.

This paper addresses the issue of the urban obsolescence of public space of social housing neighbourhoods built during the post-war period in Great Britain. Great Britain has been chosen because of the active role played by modern architects in the construction of the welfare state advocated by post-war governments, which involved building large areas of social housing. The aims of this paper are to understand the context in which these neighbourhoods were built as well as their evolution and the complexity of their obsolescence. To achieve these objectives, it first looks at the causes that prompted the slum clearance process, at its implementation during the post-war reconstruction and at the effects that this process has had on contemporary cities. Secondly, it is illustrated through a detailed analysis of a case study, Loughborough Estate in Brixton, London, looking at the initial conditions of the council estate when it was built, investigating its evolution over the past five decades and factors that may have contributed to the obsolescence of its public space and to its social problems. The paper concludes with a warning that a generalist critique of modern architecture does not solve the problems of such neighbourhoods, but a substantial intervention on the public space is needed to bring them to life. These interventions should focus on the spatial configuration of public space and its design and maintenance.

Considering the ongoing global proliferation of the urban ‘creativity fix’ and its inclination to further push local governments towards entrepreneurial governance logics and market-led development imperatives, there is a sustained need to understand how the creative city paradigm is being grounded, renegotiated and put into practice in so-called ‘Southern’ cities. To analyse Cape Town’s creative city trajectory and its eventual emergence as the ‘first African World Design Capital’ in 2014, this article brings together three strands of contemporary urban scholarship. First, it utilizes the notion of ‘worlding’ to foreground the complex and multi-scalar processes that shaped Cape Town’s ‘politics of becoming’ a creative city. Second, it draws on the related and growing body of work that engages with globally mobile urban policies, their modes of circulation, adoption and transformation in different socio-political and spatial contexts. Finally, in using this relational framework to a...

and concrete dimensions of analysis and of the ways in which planetary urbanization is being applied “in many different ways, and from various angles and approaches.” Like Brenner, Schmid concludes that these applications are evidence of affinities among the plurality of voices in urban studies. In the particular light of postcolonial and feminist engagements with planetary urbanization, Schmid holds fast to the heterodox potentiality of the theory and calls for an “open-minded, respectful, and joyful” engagement with

Informality is growing in a context of increasing inequity, and in many places becoming the norm. However, despite decades of studies and interventions, 'recognising informality' is still a key issue. This paper provides a review of the literature on informality showing the shifts in its conceptualisations. The paper firstly discusses conceptual approaches related to the term 'informality' in the context of urban development; it then examines practices within, and related to, informality; and it concludes with an appraisal of policy approaches and their impact as reported in the literature. The paper finds a wide range of conceptualisations, including the questioning of the usefulness and appropriateness of the term. It finds reported evidence of 'informality' (as understood to date) spreading to the middle classes, and increasingly emerging in the Global North. Policies seem to be lagging behind in how they engage with so-called informality, with little ackn...

In recent years, an increasing number of separation walls has been built around the world. Walls built in urban areas are particularly striking in that they have exacted a heavy toll in terms of human suffering. At the same time, however, homeless and displaced people, unprotected by any walls, often terrorised by irregular militias or evicted by the state police, have likewise endured terrible ordeals. From time to time, walls are invoked, promised, contested, challenged, struggled over. They can be protective, but the protection they grant is always selective to a significant degree. Not only does the fundamental ambivalence of walls seems intrinsic, but the spatial functioning cannot be reduced to a black-and-white picture – walls as either simply ‘good’ or ‘bad’. This collection invites to inquiry into the complexities of the social life of walls. Urban and urbanised spaces are here observed as veritable laboratories of wall-making, places where their consequences become most vi...