Towards a more equitable future-

 

Inequity is woven into the fabric of our built environment. To eradicate this problem to an extent, architecture substantiates to play a vital role. Most people think architects design buildings and cities, which has no bearing at all with equality. But really, what architects truly design are ‘relationships’. Buildings and cities are designed for people and they impact how we relate and co-exist. The quality of buildings and spaces has a strong influence on the quality of people’s lives. Decisions about the design, planning and management of places can enhance or restrict a sense of belonging. They can remove real and imagined barriers between communities and foster understanding and generosity of spirit.

The current urban distribution of land has created a gap between rich and poor. Residents’ access to services and infrastructure is also divided along lines of wealth. This creates patterns of ‘splintering urbanism’, reflecting the unequal distribution of services and infrastructure in the territory.

“Architecture students should be encouraged to apply their training to the challenges facing society.”

-Alejandro Aravena

Alejandro Aravena, a Chilean architect, has a scheme which was designed to create ‘low-cost housing’ by building the frame and the essential rooms for each house, leaving the remainder for residents to complete themselves over time. Such housing models have achieved a real step change in social housing by not only providing basic shelter but giving people capacity to improve their homes, while enhancing their equity and potential to move up and out of the poverty cycle.

In a meeting during this pandemic, Ar. Hafeez Contractor exclaimed that “In the times of pandemic people with immense luxuries realized that, they had created something huge than they can maintain.” What we can do to mend those fault lines is that we can think of a system of land distribution as per the members going to live in it. This will result in inclusionary opportunities for people below poverty line. Thus; architecture helps us to navigate situations and feelings we may never realize. It is about building relationships through the ‘alteration of space’.

More number of public spaces across the city can help establishing new bearing between people. Civil spaces because of their physical and structural aspects are a sort of symbolic, conceptual, economical and actual space which has a strong bond with city and urban structure. It acts as a platform where everyone is on same level, irrespective of what they own and where they live.

Reliable and regulated access to public. Apart from livelihoods, architecture w.r.t public spaces should aim at liquidating architectural, technological and transport barriers for not just the fittest but also for physically disabled, elderly, children and mentally challenged people by installing appropriate aids for their ease of access.

Great designs can-and should- be for everyone.

Social, cultural and economic inequalities are still being literally built into new places, and architecture has the potential to tackle with such issues, else they’ll become a “me” space, a place for individualism, emphasizing privacy over communalism. Thus, a problem for humanity and for human rights.

On contrary, architecture can also form “us” spaces. It can create places for everyone, turning formerly me-centered places into places that encourage communalism and togetherness.

There are some owners and project teams who went out of their way to include and elevate the voices of diverse project stakeholders, with the goal of promoting greater equity. Talking about one such context, how can we forget the devotion of Ar. Laurie Baker in the field of architecture for the cause. For over four decades, Baker channelled his principles of simplicity, minimalism and individuality to design low-cost, high-quality, visually unique and energy-saving houses. His vision rejected imported, pricey, energy-guzzling materials, and replaced them with local, cheap and renewable ones. His organisation’s broad spectrum of work paints across the canvases of local level planning, technical and vernacular architectural growth through research and development, educational programs and rural housing. His ideology entirely dedicated to changing the social, economic, and political position of marginalised or disadvantaged groups in society.

A design to create environments that stimulate the mind in order to create pleasure, creativity, satisfaction and enjoyment; Salutogenic design.

The framework and guidelines for salutogenic design highlights the factors like social cohesion with formal and informal meeting points, personal control for regulating lighting, daylight, sound, temperature and access to private rooms. The restorative environment should be inviting and well balanced with an aesthetic beauty that allows people to reflect and attain relaxation through quiet rooms, soft lighting, access to nature and a good view.

When talking of certain other schism that prompts bias, an alarming one is ‘Gender Bias’ [Men, Women and LGBTQ+]. To quote Hannah Rozenberg from her thesis, “Biased language leads to biased technology which in turn results in biased environments.” To tackle problems like gender bias in architectural design, as per what she says, “The first thing we need to change is language.” The idea of theoretical spaces like a library, a theatre, a cinema, a series of benches, says Rozenberg “is that people come to the space and re-think the way in which they use language and the biases that are embedded in it.”

As a species, we are now at a crucial time. More than fifty per cent of us now live in urban areas and that number is only going to increase. Over the next two decades, we will face a transformation that will determine whether the next 100 years are the best of centuries or the worst of centuries.  

In the context of such transformation and everything that comes with it—great social changes, ethnic conflicts, urban inequalities, environmental threats and economic problems; what does architecture mean? The answer is a widespread sense that much of what we have built cannot be tolerated because at the root of the human rights concept is the idea that all people should be able to live with dignity. Much of our current architecture and our beliefs about architecture do not support this. 

We are bogged down in a morass of multicultural conflict and lagging the global innovation marketplace. This is the time we live in. We must choose to be city developers; we must choose to make cities sustainable. And this is where architecture and human rights are a necessity. If we start looking at architecture as a vehicle to advance and enable human rights, we could be on our way to solving some of our largest, most urgent problems.

“The people who are creating the design should look like the people who will inhabit these wonderful spaces. That’s an equitable look.”