Open 6 Insecurity.Pdf

OPEN 6 ARTWORK-BEELDARTWORK-ENG-DIE 24-01-2011 KEURE 24-01-2011 20:59 Pagina 21:06 4 Pagina 4 Editorial JORINDE SEIJDEL public space and for themselves, and ever more control over the (IN)SECURITY other. There seems to be a veritable obsession with security. This is the first issue of open to A fearful culture is being postu- come out in cahier form and to be lated, in which, however, little is published by NAi Publishers. The clear about the nature or the new open, redesigned by Thomas provenance of the threat. Is there Buxó, is published twice a year in really danger out there, socially, a Dutch-language as well as an politically or economically English-language edition. The speaking, or is the new fear coming cahiers are thematically arranged, out of a collective sense of being with art and public space as powerless to exert any influence on starting points – not as an everyday reality, for instance? isolated phenomenon, however, but Are there perhaps so many new struc- as a component of the cultural and tures and associations emerging in social developments that define the the pluriform, multicultural and dynamics of the current public global network communities as to domain, and in relation to relevant engender a universal perception of areas such as architecture/urban being uprooted and alienated, with planning, landscape architecture, all the feelings of unease that spatial planning and digital media. this entails? Has the gap between The new open strives more than in citizens and government perhaps the past to achieve a balance grown too wide as well? Or have the between theory and direct contribu- media, with their over-exposure of tions from actual practice. It is danger and their barrage of intended for all with an interest shocking images, become the primary in the function and organization of authors of our fear? the public space and/or the role of The issue of security seems to art within it. consist of a steadily condensing constellation of disparate as well open 6 is devoted to art, public as related socio-cultural, political space and security. Within today’s and economic factors, which is public domain, the call for more increasingly coming to dominate the protection, supervision and care culture. At all events, it is ques- dominates on all fronts. The in- tionable whether the solution lies dividual and the community are in the implementation of a society demanding maximum security for the of control, or in a capsular 4 Open 2004/No. 6/(In)Security OPEN_6.indd 4 28/01/11 13:33 OPEN 6 ARTWORK-BEELDARTWORK-ENG-DIE 24-01-2011 KEURE 24-01-2011 20:59 Pagina 21:06 5 Pagina 5 society in which everything and space in philosophy, art, architec- everyone is suspect and we move ture and media, while the essay by from one protected enclave to the art and culture theorist Thomas Y. other: the rhetoric of security is Levin examines how artists working not far removed from the rhetoric in the public space relate to the of danger. In any case, thorough panoptic surveillance society. In and critical analyses of the the articles by architecture current propositions on security theorists Harm Tilman and Mark seem to be in order. For the impli- Wigley, security and architecture cations of thinking in terms of take centre stage – in the former security for the public domain, for primarily in a Dutch context and in its organization, experience and the latter in direct connection use, are considerable. Neither the with the World Trade Center perception of nor the relationship buildings in New York. There is to the public as audience and the also an autonomous visual contribu- public as sphere, in the role they tion by artist/photographer Sean play in the theory and practice of Snyder in the context of his art and public space, can remain Temporary Occupation project. untouched. This open also includes a polem- open 6 examines what lies at the ical column by Hans Boutellier, root of the public yearning for author of De Veiligheidsutopie, security, of the cumulation of offering a personal view from his fear, and what new questions are specific expertise on the possibil- being asked of and by artists, ity of art torpedoing the vacuous designers, theorists, clients and order of the Security Utopia. In policy makers. Theoretical consider- addition there are contributions ations and scenarios from art, more directly connected to concrete architecture, philosophy and events, places or (art) projects, politics are reviewed, in an providing insight into the current attempt to uncover something of the aesthetics and ethics of security. current security paradigm, or to open 6 also includes the debut of propose alternative (conceptual) a book section, which will be models. expanded in the following issue Legal philosopher Gijs van Oenen with more reviews and reports. analyses the transformation of the public sphere into ‘the new securityscape’, and art historian and philosopher Lieven De Cauter develops an initial ‘short archae- ology of the new fear’. Art critic Sven Lütticken considers fictitious and genuine models of the enclosed Editorial 5 OPEN_6.indd 5 28/01/11 13:33 OPEN 6 ARTWORK-BEELDARTWORK-ENG-DIE 24-01-2011 KEURE 24-01-2011 20:59 Pagina 21:06 6 Pagina 6 Gijs van Oenen transformation of the public sphere into an Languishing in obsessive medium of Securityscape security concerns. The Interpassive Transformation of the Public Sphere The issue of security in the public domain is not so much pre- cipitated by increased danger as primarily a problem of ‘interpassive citizenship’, according to legal philosopher Gijs van Oenen. In the following piece he examines the conditions for the 6 Open 2004/No. 6/(In)Security OPEN_6.indd 6 28/01/11 13:33 OPEN 6 ARTWORK-BEELDARTWORK-ENG-DIE 24-01-2011 KEURE 24-01-2011 20:59 Pagina 21:06 7 Pagina 7 Safety first: on this demand for the public has been outsourced. Modern citizens no domain, modern citizens and their govern- longer believe that they can control them- ment agree, however much they may selves sufficiently to bear the responsibility disagree in other respects. Safety requires for civilized public interaction. They prefer action: tough measures, clear targets. Such to turn this responsibility and accountability targets include: suspicious immigrants, over to others: the government, the police, assinine behaviour in public, highway supervisors, providers, security guards. speeding, financial swindling, unlit cycling, These old and new managers of public hooliganism, urinating in public places, space are responding with a new kind of organized crime, terrorism, smoking, urban ‘civilitarianism’, re-educating the citizen in decay, unrepentant criminals, permissive a way that reflects present-day political culture. In short, everything and everyone anxieties; in other words, in a rather author- can become a target of ‘security concerns’. itarian and moralizing way. In my view, this One consequence of this obsession with exercise is doomed to fail. The attempt to security seems clear. We can forget about the rehabilitate ‘public man’ collides with a ideal of a civilized public sphere. That was phenomenon that I refer to as interpassivity, the optimistic idea that public confrontation following cultural philosophers Robert makes for better citizens – a classic repub- Pfaller and Slavoj Zˇizˇek. Involvement or lican ideal that, in the second half of the engagement is delegated, outsourced. We twentieth century, was advocated by people would like to get involved, but we no longer like Hannah Arendt, Jürgen Habermas and believe that we can; therefore we ask others Richard Sennett. Let us call this an ideal of to get involved, on our behalf. interactive citizenship, situated in what we This does not result, however, in might call an ideoscape: a field of human obedience or docility toward such others, as relations shaped through the incessant promoters of the new civilitarianism hope. exchange of opinions and viewpoints. Two characteristics of interpassivity stand in According to this ideal, people self-actualize the way here. To begin with, delegating not simply as private persons, but also and engagement does not cause interpassive especially through interaction as citizens. In citizens to forgo their self-will. On the this interaction nothing is ‘produced’, other contrary, they persist in an indifferent denial than a more sophisticated understanding of of their public responsibility, even and in what can serve as collective aims. fact precisely when called to account for it This interactive ideoscape of the public by those to whom they have delegated it. sphere, however, is undergoing a structural This is why we see so many manifestations transformation, to use Habermas’ classical of autistic behaviour in present-day secur- terminology. I propose that it is turning into ityscapes. an interpassive securityscape. In this medium, But in addition we are witnessing a less the primary quest is not for encounter or easily explained phenomenon. Interpassivity confrontation, but for security. The public also leads to an intense, almost compulsive sphere is turning into a security sanctum, fascination for those who have been which can be briefly defined as a space in entrusted with the care and responsibility which the concern for civilized behaviour for public affairs. An obsessive interest Languishing in Securityscape 7 OPEN_6.indd 7 28/01/11 13:33 OPEN 6 ARTWORK-BEELDARTWORK-ENG-DIE 24-01-2011 KEURE 24-01-2011 20:59 Pagina 21:06 8 Pagina 8 develops in the mechanisms of the system or something is watching on our behalf. to which the bearers of the delegated This was illustrated by an installation by responsibility are connected. This meta- Eija-Liisa Ahtila in 2002 at Tate Modern.

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