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For an Architecture of Radical Democracy Dural Tweaks in Purely Technical Terms) Peggy Deamer & Manuel Shvartzberg as a natural reality stemming from individual’s Thus, in Laclau and Mouffe’s theory, work, natural preferences and requiring only proce- workers, and the working class are reconceived For an Architecture of Radical Democracy dural tweaks in purely technical terms). Argu- as follows: (1) In lieu of the idea that the eco- ing that there is simply no outside to the social nomic process is a categorical, ‘transparent’, itself—no privileged vantage point from which and objective phenomenon where capital and to formulate a total perspective on it—Laclau labour relate exclusively in economic terms, and Mouffe propose that culture replaces struc- Laclau and Mouffe argue that socio-cultural to this question. It is enlightening because it 2 Any viable political project in architecture to- ture as the chief mediating agent of the social. relations are fundamental to the economic pro- re-focuses Marxist critique for the current day must contend with the idea and practices of This cultural versus structural description of cess. The fact that workers are able to socially economic regime under explicitly postmodern radical democracy. At a time of global socio-po- society attempts to reckon with identifications organize themselves and affect the nature and conditions and it is applicable because it offers a litical and economic upheaval, the architectural that are not just economically illogical, but often terms of their working conditions de-mystifies scalable model for how architecture and archi- 3 profession, like other collectives, seeks models contradictory. Yet such identifications may pro- the idea that “the economy could be under- tectural work can be rethought in this context. and institutions that will allow it to address its duce contingent alliances that can enlist differ- stood as an autonomous and self-regulated We argue that any progressive political activism 5 grievances as part of this upheaval. The par- ent actors (with divergent interests) into a com- universe.” (2) In lieu of the idea of the working within (and without) architecture must contend ticular fallouts within architecture are multiple mon project, at least for a determined period of class as a homogenous unity that fully identi- with radical democracy’s insights if it wants and well-known: high rates of un- or under- time. In this sense, it is a non-teleological theory fies with itself in a common economic context, to address architecture’s structural problems. employment, low and unequal pay and fees, of social change—pragmatic and instrumental the authors find the working class is a divided Radical democracy offers a viable understand- terrible work-life balance, mountains of student rather than historically deterministic. It also and divisive category, with unequal groups ing of the relation between architecture as an debt, lack of access for minorities, and a lack of rethinks class, in as much as the “working class” (sexes, races, legal status, etc.) and unequal actor within civil society and the state, and pro- socially-rewarding and meaningful projects to is displaced from its conditions (hours, cesses of social change. work on, among others. position as singular salaries, benefits), This essay will fall into two parts: reviewing DEAMER & SHVARTZBERG While architecture has typically shrugged agent of historical and that these are some of the main ideas of radical democracy off these social issues as largely exogenous to change, with a defini- “political, not merely and considering them in relation to architecture 6 the discipline, a growing number of practi- tion that relies on fluid economic divisions.” and architectural work. tioners and theorists have come to appreciate identities and power And (3) the authors these political realities directly through their Radical Democracy relations dependent dismiss the primacy work experiences as architects, not as parallel on a given moment’s of revolution—cri- or external to it. Hence we see the awkward correlation of socio- tiquing modernist CRITIQUES Radical democracy, while emergent from Marx- manoeuvrings of conservative architectural political forces. Build- avant-gardes’ privi- ist discourse, is fundamentally at odds with a institutions like the AIA to try and cover their ing on the work of An- leged access to “a ra- number of classical Marxist tenets. The central- Architecture Lobby members perform outside the crisis of legitimacy (catalysed, most recently, by tonio Gramsci, Laclau tional and necessary ity of “revolution” as a transcendental break Pennsylvania Convention Center during the 2016 Na- their infamous reaction to Donald Trump’s in- and Mouffe theorize movement of history with the past, the privileged role of the working tional AIA Convention. frastructure plans) through ineffective and su- class around the im- accessible to scien- class as the agent of historical change, and the 7 perficial “reports,” “listening rounds,” and other portance of moral and tific knowledge” —an 1 ascendancy of economics over any other social recuperative strategies of corporate “inclusion.” intellectual influence, including the integration idea that assumes teleological historical devel- determination, are critically reconceived. As a Rather than dealing with these structural of extra-class values, habits, and narratives as the opment, and a separation between leadership theory, radical democracy attempts to under- problems in a remedial and patchwork fash- foundations of political struggle. In short, they and ordinary citizens. Instead, they promote a stand “the ontology of the social” while reject- ion, the moment demands a more systematic claim, ideology ought to be understood as an constantly dynamic process of reconfiguration ing the truisms of essentialist models that en- analysis—in effect, an effort to align the reali- “organic and relational whole, embodied in insti- of individual and collective identities, implying shrine any social order as natural or inevitable. ties of architecture today with the discourses tutions and apparatuses” rather than reflecting constant struggle and antagonism without any In a critically post-modern fashion, Laclau and 4 and practices of progressive politics at large. only structures of production. historically-preordained resolution. What are their relations, if any, and how might Mouffe break with the modern social science they suggest more effective models of political idea that “the social” can be represented in its 2. For important challenges to Laclau and Mouffe’s post- term that Gramsci gives to a process of identity formation agency for architecture? totality, as something objective and external— structuralist framework, which we have attempted to where culture plays an outsized role in cultivating consent in effect, challenging both classical Marxist incorporate in what follows, see: Ellen Meiksins Wood, The across groups with different interests; it does not negate The concept of “radical democracy,” first Retreat From Class: A New 'True' Socialism (London: Verso, the role of economic relations, but incorporates them into a theorized by Chantal Mouffe and Ernesto orthodoxy (that would see the world as a pri- 1986). For an influential history of the relations between post- new interpretive synthesis. See: Antonio Gramsci, Selections Laclau in their seminal 1985 book, Hegemony marily economic structure totalized by capital- structuralist and Marxist theories, see: Perry Anderson, In the from the Prison Notebooks of Antonio Gramsci (New York: ism as a mode of production) as well as liberal Tracks of Historical Materialism (London: Verso, 1983). International, 1995). and Socialist Strategy: Towards a R adical Dem- 3. Laclau and Mouffe’s framework is based on Antonio 4. Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, Hegemony and Socialist ocratic Politics, offers enlightening approaches political philosophy (that would see the market Gramsci’s theorization of hegemony, in which cultural Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Politics (London: Verso, relations are attributed a more important role than in purely 1985), 67. ‘economistic’ Marxist models. Through a layered political, 5. Ibid., 80. 1. See The Architecture Lobby, “A Response to AIA Values”, economic, and cultural reading, Gramsci explains why 6. Ibid., 82. The Avery Review 23, April 2017. Available at: http://averyreview. certain social actors do not identify as “working class” and 7. Ibid., 84. com/issues/23/a-response-to-aia-values act against their own material interests. Hegemony is the 24 PROJECT Issue 7 25 The theory of radical democracy seeks to nomic and political events that reflect the full aspect can be understood schematically in bilizing architectural responses to all of these give these endless (cultural) struggles an ap- blush of present-day neoliberalism. Advanced terms of scales—(1) the geopolitical as it affects conditions. In part, this involves promoting propriate (cultural, political, and economic) neoliberalism exacerbates the struggles previ- architecture; (2) the associations that configure alternative financial strategies that look beyond outlet that will displace violence in favour of ously identified in the critique of late capital- architectural communities, organizations, and neoliberalism itself, pushing to abandon both more democratic forms of action—what Mouffe ism—the coercions of anti-labor policies, institutions; and (3) the discourses and policies capitalist globalism and nationalist isolationism would subsequently theorize further as “demo- austerity,
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