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Previous posting In early February Daniel Libeskind gave a lecture in Belfast (“Ethics Debate: Take an ethical stance, Libeskind tells his peers”, Building Design online, 15 Feb 08) and told the audience: “I won’t work for totalitarian regimes… I think architects should take a more ethical stance.” In this case he was speaking directly of boycotting any work in China. While his announcement raised some hackles in the architectural community (“Libeskind’s China boycott a ‘stunt’, says van Egeraat”, Building Design online, 20 Mar 08), and Libeskind’s own work in Hong Kong seems to belie his stance, still, the fact that he has brought the issue of ethics to the fore in mainstream circles of the profession is a worthy achievement in itself. It would not have been nearly as likely to be newsworthy had it been some lesser architectural light. The question has been thrown out there. Lots of them, in fact. There are first the questions concerning principles and, then, if we can answer them, those of how those principles can be best applied.
Principles: Why is China being singled out here? Is it only the timing? Olympics, the current unrest in Tibet? One of Libeskind’s principles here is participation: “We don’t know if is there a public process — who owns this place, this home, this land?” If participation and ownership of land are the central principles then it’s not simply refusing to work for totalitarian regimes – most projects, clients and countries would have to be boycotted – a point raised by both Nabeel Hamdi and Erick van Egeraat in the follow-up article “Libeskind’s China boycott a ‘stunt’, says van Egeraat”. Does a ‘public hearing’ constitute ample participation? Are the state’s expropriation powers used legitimately? (see, for example, Kelo v. New London). Instead of countries, perhaps we should be boycotting building types. This is the approach taken by ADPSR in its boycott of the design of prisons. Extending the principles ADPSR applied suggests that there are many other building types that deserve attention. Shopping malls? Should we really be designing temples to conspicuous consumption on the one hand and railing on about climate change and higher environmental standards on the other? Application: Is a boycott the most effective approach? Perhaps for high profile architects that can help. How effective has the ADPSR boycott been? There are other approaches that might be considered. One that we are looking at now is the use of the front end of contracts to raise standards for human rights. Many architects have applied this method to raise environmental standards for their work. There is no reason this can’t be done in the arena of rights. This applies not only to conditions for labourers and their families living on site and in construction camps of international projects. It also applies to the rights of those affected by projects. The Three Gorges Dam certainly raised those issues for more than a million people, even if it failed to raise them for the engineers conducting the CIDA-supported feasibility study for the Chinese government. Finally, I have to say, van Egeraat’s statement that ‘Ideologising architecture is wrong’ indicates a radical but typical dissociation with the reality of architecture. All architecture is ideoligised – the failure to understand that is what allows the profession to continue to ignore these fundamental issues of ethics and human rights. It is not about the relative lack of power of architects and architecture. Robert Venturi made a similar comment about architecture in Complexity and Contradiction back in 1965: "The architect's ever diminishing power and his growing ineffectualness in shaping the whole environment can perhaps be reversed, ironically, by narrowing his concerns and concentrating on his own job. Perhaps then relationships and power will take care of themselves." The fact is, though, that power will always take care of itself and, unchecked, it will roll over us all as it did for more than a million people living beyond the Three Gorges Dam (or any of the more than 500 dams the World Bank and other agencies have funded); as it did for the victims of post-war urban renewal until Jane Jacobs’ voice created a fundamental change in the way we perceived cities and communities. The list is long. Is our response really to be ‘ideologising architecture is wrong’ or that we should ‘concentrate on our own jobs’? I would hope not. We live in the world not in architectural magazines. I would disagree with Libeskind’s simplistic approach but I vehemently disagree with Venturi of 40 years ago or van Egeraat today. We have an obligation both as professionals and as human beings to be more responsive than that. Back in 1968 the AIA invited the civil rights leader Whitney Young Jr. to address their annual convention. With the Watts riots in 1965 and the burning of Detroit and Newark in 1967, the AIA was, no doubt, wondering just why it was that black people in the US were so darned upset that they responded by burning down the city – acts guaranteed to get the attention of architects. Young said to his audience: ". . . you are not a profession that has distinguished itself by your social and civic contributions to the cause of civil rights, and I am sure this does not come to you as any shock. You are most distinguished by your thunderous silence and your complete irrelevance.” ("Man and His Social Conscience". pp. 44-49, AIA Journal, Vol 50:3, September 1968.) Not much has changed, it seems to me. And with van Egeraat’s ideological blinders firmly in place in the profession at large, I don’t see that much will.
A rights-based approach to development + design This past July Prof. Wangari Maathai gave a lecture that brought home the relationship between many of the JAM themes. It is in their integration, it seems to me, where the future of cities has hope. She said: “Equitable distribution of resources cannot be effected unless there is democratic space, which respects the rule of law and human rights. Such democratic space gives citizens an enabling environment to be creative and productive.” The Nobel Committee, in recognizing Prof. Maathai’s efforts with the Green Belt Movement over the last 30 years, has helped her to highlight some important relationships, among them that between the access to resources and the strength of democracy; between human rights and the state of the environment. Between democratic/inclusive space and the changing institutions of democracy – this requires an understanding on the part of designers of space that such a relationship exists and that participatory planning is an essential part of that development; between one’s rights as written and their realization in the built environment; between the theory and the implementation of the UN policy on the rights-based approach to development(http://www.unhchr.ch/development/approaches.html); in the education of development practitioners (particularly engineers and architects) on human rights issues affecting their work; between the prevention of abuse and the redress of abuse. From my experience working with students in many of the marginalized communities in Bangkok and, more recently, with communities recovering from the tsunami, design can be a powerful force in the prevention of evictions, in the support of participatory processes and in the self-determination of communities. between the green and brown issues. That people have a right to housing should not be at the expense of the air they breathe, of the land they depend upon for food; in education (particularly technical) concerning community design/development. This is one of the key objectives of the Centre for Architecture and Human Rights; Much of what national and international bodies do in supporting rights is focused on law and on the redress of abuse and injustice. However, law is not the only tool we have at our disposal to address these issues. The Green Belt Movement has made it quite clear that the act of planting trees is one that empowers communities and in so doing, strengthens democracy and rights. I see that as a key means of obviating abuse.
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CURRENT ACTIVITIES: |
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COURSES: |
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BUILDING: |
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· Unfolding School (upcoming) · Portable School (operating) |
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WRITING: |
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Just completed: · “Surviving the Second Tsunami: land rights in the face of buffer zones, land grabs, and development” (2010), in Lizarralde, G., Davidson, C., and Johnson, C. (eds.), Rebuilding after disasters: From emergency to sustainability, Taylor & Francis. · “Rendered Invisible: Urban Planning, Cultural Heritage, and Human Rights” (forthcoming), in Logan, W., Nic Craith, M., and Langfield, M. (eds.)Cultural Diversity, Heritage and Human Rights, Routledge. For April 2010: · "Architecture & Human Rights" (forthcoming) in Cushman, Thomas (ed.), Handbook of Human Rights, Routledge. |
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TEACHING |
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Professional Degree Programme (with KMUTT) · Studio – Community Design · Architecture and Human Rights · Ethics for Design Professionals · Housing · Professional Practice · Environmental Psychology · Human Impacts on the Environment
Continuing Professional Development: · Architecture and Human Rights (AIBC, for May 2010) · Migrant Construction Workers: Architectural Responses in the International Arena (AIBC, 2009) · The Portable School (MADE, 2009) · Right to the City (RAIC, 2006) · The Role of Architecture in Post-Disaster Development (RAIC, 2005) |
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CAHR 2010: |
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10 KEY PROJECTS: |
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· International Studio (Phnom Penh) · Kids & the Built Environment 1 · Kids & the Built Environment 2 · Portable School · Training Programmes · Continuing Professional Development · Migrant Construction Workers study · Symposium 2010 · Urban Codes & Human Rights · Construction contracts and Human Rights |
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CONTACT: |
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CAHR International 464 Stannard Avenue,
CAHR in Thailand 231/2 South Sathorn Road, |
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IN THE NEWS: |
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· Executive Director, Graeme Bristol interviewed in architectureBC, January 2010 · Executive Director, Graeme Bristol interviewed by Bangkok Post, August 2009 · Portable School on Thai Channel 9 and Executive Director Graeme Bristol interviewed. · Executive Director, Graeme Bristol interviewed by Radio Nederlands |
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· March— Bangkok: The homeless of Sanam Luang (with KMUTT) · May—Vancouver : Lecture at AGM of AIBC · Jun—Completion of Draft, ‘Architecture and Human Rights’ · October—Bangkok |