51N4E | Jaspers-Eyers Architects | l’AUC | HCP | Happel Cornelisse Verhoeven | Kéré Architecture | Jahn | Abdel Moneim Mustafa | RZERO estudio | SO? Architecture and Ideas
This year, around half of the global population is invited to the polls: elections are taking place in 64 countries, in addition to European Union elections. At the same time, democracies feel increasingly fragile, undermined by autocratic forces and corporate lobbying.
This issue turns its gaze to sites of democracy: to traditional seats of power such as parliaments, but also to spaces clawed back for public dialogue: a politicians’ private pool transformed into a municipal hall in Istanbul, ‘symbolises a broader shift that is helping redraw Turkey’s political map,’ writes Jennifer Hattam.
The reverse, however, is so much more common. Once a civic building, the James R Thompson Center in Chicago is set to become an office for Google, while in Brussels, the new home of the Flemish government designed by architects including 51N4E is an elaborate experiment in real estate speculation.
The struggle for democracy is made evident in the stories of cities and nations that have regained their independence after living under colonial or apartheid rule, such as Windhoek. In a short window of time, Abdel Moneim Mustafa’s work in newly independent Sudan demonstrated ways in which architecture could be used as a tool for emancipation.
Beyond the ability to imagine alternative spaces and structures, architects are also citizens, able to critically engage with the world around them by heading to the polls, engaging with revisionist histories and denouncing anti-democratic practices. As Jan-Werner Müller writes in the keynote, ‘Democracy is not just about elections, but continuous critical questioning.’
1511: Democracy
Cover (above) Denis Farrell / Associated Press / Alamy
In April 1994, South Africa held its first general election in which citizens of all races were allowed to vote. Nearly 20 million votes were counted as queues for polling stations snaked through the streets
Folio (lead image)
A senator is depicted casting a vote into an urn on a coin dating from 63 BCE. Far from an idyllic democracy, however, the electorate of the Roman Republic excluded women, millions of enslaved people, and initially even people who lived outside Rome
Keynote
Democratic designs
Jan-Werner Müller
Building
Capital gains: ZIN in Brussels, Belgium, by 51N4e, Jaspers-Eyers Architects and l’AUC
Christophe Van Gerrewey
Essay
Centre of power: the New Administrative Capital of Egypt
Yasmine El Rashidi
Typology
Parliaments
Sophia Psarra
Outrage
Chinese parliaments on the African continent
Innocent Batsani-Ncube
Revisit
James R Thompson Center, Chicago, United States by Helmut Jahn
Zach Mortice
Essay
Traces of violence in Windhoek
Frank Steinhofer
Essay
A forbidden history of Tiananmen Square
Stephen Daker
Reputations
Abdel Moneim Mustafa
Esra Akcan
Building
Public property: urban interventions in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Mexico, by RZERO estudio
Michael Snyder
Building
Conversion of a swimming pool into a public hall in Istanbul, Turkey, by So? Architecture and Ideas
Jennifer Hattam
Essay
Platform politics: ‘deep states’ and ‘diagonalists’ go online
Rob Gallagher
Interview
Grace Blakeley
Eleanor Beaumont
Exhibition
The Gift: Stories of Generosity and Violence in Architecture
Florian Heilmeyer
Book
Architecture Against Democracy: Histories of the Nationalist International
Enrique Ramírez
