Political Matters

This thematic issue of Interstices, Political Matters, approaches architecture be- yond aesthetic analysis, and more than a mere branch of traditional art history or a civilisation’s will to form (Kwinter, 2001). Nor do we consider it as utilitarian space to maximise particular behaviours (Bentham, 1843), or in an essentialised way whereby inhabitation and place-making are contextually and ontologically given (Heidegger, 1927), or historically predetermined. Instead architecture, and more broadly urban space, are understood as political forces in and of themselves, meaning that they can enforce sociopolitical changes. The urgency of engaging with the political significance of architecture and urban space is because we can no longer afford to reduce them to neutral backdrops of political realities. The ongoing and increasing global crises are explicit evidence of the inherent role of architecture and urbanism in the structural racism embedded in urban planning, the brutal treatment of asylum seekers, the desire for spaces of commerce to accumulate capital for the few rather than civic spaces to enable the agency of citizenship, the micropolitics and surveillance of social distancing during the pandemic, in addition to global warming, food scarcity, maritime territorialisation, and modern forms of slavery. As such, architecture can no longer be understood as that which is built on stable ground; economics is not static and neither is state power, the urban fabric is stretched across the globe (Lefebvre, 1970). Likewise, architecture and urbanism cannot be removed from their connections to digital technology, mass media, the military and the law. Politics is spatial. Moreover, architecture and urban space can be deployed as tools for radical and revolutionary changes, since collective awareness, resistance and social movements have a spatial dimension (Harvey, 2013). The premise of change is undeniably enveloped in the rethinking of what architecture is by questioning its role, influence and ethical responsibility, as well as addressing how architecture and the urban can help articulate global concerns, and possibly offer alternatives.