Towards an Agonistic Urbanism

Towards an Agonistic Urbanism Tbilisi’s search for democratic urban governance Benjamin Wells By the same author: Tbilisi City Forum p.18

Figure 1: A mapping of conflictual buildings in central Tbilisi (the darkest buildings are those most frequently negotiated between stakeholders, based on author’s research).

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Tbilisi, the capital city of Georgia, has experienced several distinct epochs of urban governance within its turbulent recent history, each of which has had a marked impact on the city’s urban fabric. The country’s adoption of capitalist democracy after the fall of the Soviet Union promised a new Tbilisi, but a passive civil society coupled with fledgling state institutions left the city exposed to the forces of capitalist urbanisation and its desire for perpetual growth, often at the expense of urban quality and social wellbeing. The city is now in a state of crisis, with severe air pollution, lack of public space and greenery, over densification and endless traffic defining its urban condition.

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Tbilisi has moved through eras of ‘citizen urbanism’, ‘developer urbanism’ and ‘politicised urbanism’, and is now reacting to an increasingly active civil society demanding their right to shape the city. City Hall is increasingly responsive to these demands, and an imminent masterplan will set a clear direction for the city for the first time since the fall of the Soviet Union. This creates a determining moment in Tbilisi’s evolution, suggesting it is pertinent to now reflect on the city’s recent urban history and offer a perspective on its future development. Whilst the field of urban actors in Tbilisi is expanding, the current democratic system risks institutionalising the political through consensual governance, thus nullifying its antagonistic potential.

The essay therefore looks towards the creation of a symbolic common space that facilitates a productive agonistic urbanism, allowing a diverse network of urban actors to engage in urban politics through confrontation and negotiated conflict rather than a pretension to common consensus.

An Agonistic Democratic Politics Georgia’s expeditious adoption of both democracy and capitalism has constructed a complex ideological contradiction; conflict and negotiation on the one hand, and individualism, consensus and the apolitical on the other.

As explored by Rancière, Žižek and Mouffe, the contemporary city has entered a ‘post-political’ condition, where political space is retreating whilst social space is increasingly ‘colonised or sutured by consensual technomanagerial policies.’1 This trend towards consensus is built on the acceptance of the capitalist market and the liberal state as the organisational foundations of society, thus negating the need for the political2. Mouffe argues that the uncontested hegemony of liberalism prevents us from thinking politically, as political questions are defined as technical questions to be solved by experts and algorithms, not confrontation and negotiation. The dominant tendencies of liberalism are rationalistic and individualistic, which are unable to comprehend the pluralistic nature of society and its inherent contradictions. Liberalism may accept the existence of conflicting views and values, but only when they coalesce into a ‘harmonious ensemble’ through rational consensus,3 therefore diminishing all antagonism.

Rancière, Žižek and Mouffe all agree that these conditions have led to an almost universal ‘post-political’ era, and its reinstatement is dependent on an understanding of the ‘unconditional primacy of the inherent antagonism 1 Erik Swyngedouw. Designing the Post-Political City and the Insurgent Polis.

Civic City Cahier 5. (London : Bedford Press. 2011) p11 2 Jacques Rancière claims that this consensus constitutes the end of politics.

Jacques Rancière, Dissensus: On Politics and Aesthetics, ed. Steven Corcoran, (Continuum. 2010) 3 Those that do not conform to the rational consensus are categorically excluded.

as constitutive of the political.’4 Mouffe expands on this understanding through her discussion of the hegemonic nature of every social order, which is therefore always challenged by counter hegemonies. She argues that this struggle is central to a vibrant democracy, and is the ‘configuration of power relations around which society is structured.’5 However, this ideal contrasts the reality of the postideological consensus, where politics is reduced to social administration and every contradiction is excluded through post-democratic governmental techniques.6 This follows the Foucauldian concept of governmentality as a technique of governance; a regulatory practice which replaces conflict with ‘technocratic approaches that promote unanimity and consensus’.7 If a vibrant democracy is defined by the balance of two lines of power8 - of representation and of participation - then the processes of governmentality heavily emphasises the power of representation; the institutionalised process of elected representatives that revokes the requirement for citizen participation, and thus antagonistic conflict.

An Agonistic Urbanism Considering the crisis of the contemporary city, Mouffe, Swyngedouw and Aureli discuss the potential of agonistic urban politics in resisting the post-political condition outlined above. This agonistic network of governance would allow conflicting hegemonies to confront one another, desiring an end to conflict but also with an acceptance of its perpetual existence, therefore providing an ‘arena where differences can be confronted’9 and channelled into productive outcomes. Mouffe argues that this arena is vital in resisting the hegemony of liberalism and its rejection of the political.

Swyngedouw advocates for ‘symbolic spaces for dissensual public encounter and exchange’10; a multitude of social spaces, both material and metaphorical, that embody an agonistic model of democratic politics even if they do not yet sit within the context of a larger agonistic political structure. Artistic and architectural intervention only has power in resisting the ‘total social mobilisation of capitalism’11 if its field is expanded to engage with a broad 4 Slavoj Žižek. ‘Carl Schmitt in the Age of Post-Politics’ in The Challenges of Carl Schmitt. ed. Chantal Mouffe (London: Verso. 1999), pp. 18-37, p29 5 Chantal Mouffe. Hegemony, Radical Democracy, and the Political. ed. James Martin (Oxon: Routledge. 2013) p212 6 ‘A post-democratic society is one that continues to have and to use all the institutions of democracy, but in which they increasingly become a formal shell.’

Colin Crouch. Five minutes with Colin Crouch. (London School of Economics.

Feb 2013.)

7Jesko Fezer. Design In & Against the Neoliberal City. Civic City Cahier 6.

(Bedford Press. 2013) p9 8 These two lines of ‘mutually require each other to be deeply democratic.’ Iris Marion Young Inclusion and Democracy. (Oxford University Press. 2000) p124 9 Chantal Mouffe. The Democratic Paradox. (London, New York : Verso, 2000) 10 Erik Swyngedouw. Designing the Post-Political City and the Insurgent Polis.

Civic City Cahier 5. (London : Bedford Press. 2011) p11 11 Chantal Mouffe. ‘Artistic Activism and Agonistic Spaces.’ in Art & Research.

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Figure 2 A timeline of Tbilisi’s urbanism epochs.

Whilst certain historic events defined shifts in urban governance, the boundary between each epoch is of course fluid.

Figure 3 Uncontrolled urbanisation in central Tbilisi Photo Š Mikho Sturua From http://cyxymu.livejournal.com/ (accessed Nov 2016)

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Figure 4 The forthcoming masterplan.

Author’s mapping of the masterplan’s main interests, including polycentrism, urban ecology, connectivity, land use and urban boundaries.

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spectrum of social spaces and a diversified network of actors, including a more meaningful inclusion of citizens and their right to ‘reshape the processes of urbanisation.’1 Particular intervention must be built on an understanding of the political in its ‘antagonistic dimension as well as the contingent nature of any type of social order,’2 and therefore requires a close examination of the specific political and social contexts.

The Context of Tbilisi Tbilisi’s processes of urban governance have traversed several distinct phases in the past three decades, revealing marked shifts of power between urban actors and therefore providing interesting material for an analysis of (realised and potential) agonistic urban politics.

Tbilisi’s current condition is an accumulation of the material effects of these conflicting epochs of governance, dense with the ideological ruins of Socialism, parodied democracy and a failing neoliberal order.3

The contemporary condition What are the key challenges that your organisation faces?

“Poor to very bad legislation, bad governance, incompetence of official bodies like City Hall, nonexistent concept for the future development of the city, nihilistic citizens, poorly developed civil society and democracy.”4 The current condition of urban governance in Tbilisi increasingly represents an amalgamation of the three highlighted epochs of post-independence urbanism citizen, developer and politicised urbanisms - with the state, developers and some civil society organisations all playing a role in the development of the city.5 There is an increasingly active architecture and planning department within the City Hall who have recently begun engaging with citizen groups on specific urban issues as well as regulating developer-led urbanisation. This shift away from a single-actor urbanism represents an expanding actor field,6 albeit an informal and ambiguous one (see figure 9). Nevertheless, the primary force in Tbilisi’s urban development is still the law of supply and demand, which overwhelms any concept or practice of

1 Harvey advocates citizen’s ‘Right to the City’ - ‘a right to change ourselves by changing the city.’ ‘this transformation inevitably depends upon the exercise of a collective power to reshape the processes of urbanisation.’ David Harvey.

‘The Right to the City’. in New Left Review. II 53 (2008) pp. 23–40. p23 2 Mouffe. ‘Artistic Activism and Agonistic Spaces.’ (as previous) 3 Please explore the author’s digital, open-source mapping of Tbilisi’s ‘ideological ruins’, through the following link; https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1gqIIRY0saAkvYgTb_ afwTvHa7Lc&usp=sharing 4 Nino Tchatchkhiani. Tbilisi Forum for Architecture. Survey respondent, November 2016.

5 Increased citizen reaction to urban transformations and adoption of European urban models has inspired a renewed interest in the ‘liveability’ of the city.

6 This expanded actor field has created a discourse around many key urban issues that was nonexistent several years ago.

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urban politics through an ‘ongoing radical economisation and depoliticisation of social space’7 and the city at large.

The state increasingly resembles Foucauldian governmentality, either organising the urban through techno-managerial or assigning it to the market. A deeply embedded belief that a combination of ‘strong property laws and creative developers will bring out the best possible spatial organisation in the most efficient manner,’8 further secures the liberalist hegemony by legitimising its actions, whilst negating the need for centralised planning. The lack of a consistent vision for the city maintains that all urban actors are striving for diverging future cities, and this ambiguity ensures that conflict cannot be productive due to the absence of common grounding.

Citizen participation is widely considered ‘as voting for politicians who will be assisted by civil servants. Scientific experts are useful to define the minimum regulations, which optimise markets while minimising social problems…

Citizens participate by behaving in a disciplined manner, obeying the laws;’9 a system of governmentality that creates an idealised non-conflictual system of governance.

There is an increasing number of individuals that resist this suppression, forming activist groups or joining NGOs, but they risk either becoming instituted through ‘publicprivate stakeholder participatory forms of governance’ or ‘radically marginalised.’10 City Hall and other state bodies are increasingly accepting stakeholder antagonism into their organisations, but with an ambition for consensus through managerial processes. Whilst this may suggest improved participation, many of the interviewed actors stated that this had never offered significant results and led to a general feeling of ‘activist fatigue’, in no small part due to the fact that City Hall, however good its intentions, has very limited political or legal power in resisting the liberalist hegemony that prevails.11 Furthermore, these activist movements have limited agency as their inherently reactionary form can only respond to concrete socio-spatial issues, preventing a more preemptive or constructive participation. Whilst increased citizen engagement would seem to reflect a more agonistic democracy, Swyngedouw argues that this elevates specific urban conflicts to the political, as ‘rituals of resistance … staged as performative gestures’,12 thus reducing the sphere of antagonism to a single urban 7 Jesko Fezer. Design In & Against the Neoliberal City. Civic City Cahier 6.

(Bedford Press. 2013) 8 van Assche et al. ‘Changing Frames: Citizen and Expert Participation in Georgian Planning’. (as previous) 9 Ibid.

10 Swyngedouw. Designing the Post-Political City and the Insurgent Polis. (as previous) 11“City Hall want society to be more active. We have limited political and legal little power, and therefore require society and NGOs to help us achieve our aspirations for the city. It is in City Hall’s interest for civil society to react, respond and engage with urban issues.”

Giorgi Gabunia, Adviser for Sustainable Development. City Hall representative.

Interviewed October 2016.

12 Swyngedouw. Designing the Post-Political City and the Insurgent Polis. (as previous)

issue (politicising the particular1) and maintaining the system that creates them. Mouffe would contend that this activism still plays an important role in the ‘hegemonic struggle by subverting the dominant hegemony and by contributing to the construction of new subjectivities,’2 providing that these currently fragmented and isolated citizen resistances are connected across multiples levels of struggle. The lack of this connectivity presents itself as one of the main obstructions to the coalescing of multiple urban movements; these fragmented communities have limited power in resisting the tendencies of both governmentality and liberalism.

Salukvadze claims that the current system of urban governance and development is imbalanced with distorted roles, and criticises the ‘lack of consensus and systematic conflict between stakeholders’.3 Mouffe would argue, however, that striving for this illusion of consensus is to reject the antagonism inherent to democracy, creating a post-political condition that ‘forestalls the articulation of divergent, conflicting and alternative trajectories of future urban possibilities and assemblages,’4 even if the existing conflict in Tbilisi’s urban governance is clearly having a negative impact on the city.

This begs the question, how can the conflicting interests of these urban actors be recognised and negotiated into productive outcomes, without acceding to the liberalist trends of an equalising consensus or false politicisation of the particular?

position in the domain of administrative representational governance, which negates the inherent antagonism of citizen participation and disregards the contradictory nature of heterogenous socio-spatial practices. This post-political condition, as outlined by Mouffe et al., has allowed the hegemony of liberalist ideology to prevail, and its material ramifications now define Tbilisi’s urbanity.

The mapping of these failures has suggested that successful urban governance is reliant on proactive state institutions that define and enforce relevant policy and guidelines, coupled with an active civil society which responds to these impositions, through a critical and formalised network that facilitates participation between the state, the market and citizens. The weighting of power between these entities should be in perpetual flux, but is contingent on this connection to ensure the democratic challenging of hegemonies - the confrontation central to a vibrant democracy and politics proper, as argued by Mouffe et al.

As discussed, the potential value in this communication is increasingly recognised in Tbilisi, and the impending masterplan exemplifies this shift in thought. Commissioned through an open competition, a collaboration of governmental bodies and NGOs are working to define an ambitious and holistic direction for the city’s development, for the first time since independence.7 (see figure 10)

Whilst democratisation may suggest increased opportunity for wider participation in urban politics, Tbilisi’s recent history has created a complex urban condition with various political, social, economic, and spatial conditions preventing the evolution of an agonistic urban governance.

The history of urban conflict can be traced to its current

The field of urban actors is indeed expanding, with both governmental bodies and civil society increasingly responding to urban issues, thus suggesting that the dilemma lies not in the lack of antagonism but in the lack of facilitation of this antagonism. Many local actors highlighted the absence of a platform between the state, private sector and civil society through which to facilitate discussion and negotiate conflict regarding urban issues. This is exemplified by the fact that citizens will react strongly to tangible sociospatial concerns but do not engage with the scale of urban design which creates them, due to the lack of bridging of this scalar void. This essay has made it clear that this absence of connectivity, between both actors and issues, is central to the crisis of contemporary Tbilisi.8. The resulting lack of communication presents itself as the main obstacle to a more democratic, agonistic urban governance; there is no space that gives ‘a voice to all those who are silenced within the framework of the existing hegemony.’9 The conflict that makes itself heard is in unproductive forms, in isolated incidences, and must be understood as within a system which strives to subdue its contradictions

1 Slavoj Žižek - this risks politicising the particular; the system reduces the overall demand of a particular group to a singular demand with its particular content. Žižek, Slavoj. The Ticklish Subject: The Absent Centre of Political Ontology.

(London: Verso. 1999) 2 Mouffe. ‘Artistic Activism and Agonistic Spaces.’ (as previous) 3 Salukvadze. Changing patterns of urban development in the post-Soviet Tbilisi. (as previous) 4 Swyngedouw. Designing the Post-Political City and the Insurgent Polis. (as previous) 5 Nino Tchatchkhiani. Tbilisi Forum for Architecture. Survey response, November 2016.

6 Natalia Davlianidze. Caucasus Environmental NGO Network (CENN). Survey response, November 2016.

7 The masterplan, which the author was invited to study a draft of in Oct 2016, will put many key issues (transport, greenery, the river etc) back into the foreground of urban discourse, and marks a shift away from the preoccupation in the power of individual buildings, “the power of Tbilisi does not lie in any one individual building” - Merab Bolkvadze, Lead Urban Planner.

City Institute Georgia Interviewed in Tbilisi, Oct 2016.

8 There are several NGOs that attempt to fill this void, such as the Goethe Institute and CAMPUS, but these have limited public influence.

“We work to find a way, to create a bridge, to connect governmental organisations, private sector and public organisations, because we think it is very important for future urban development that these sectors work together. Only than do we have a real opportunity to make changes.” - Natalia Nebieridze, Campus / REALLAB. 9 Mouffe. ‘Artistic Activism and Agonistic Spaces.’ (as previous)

Towards an Agonistic Urbanism?

Describe the relationship between state, private and public sectors: “Governmental organisations have no vision, the private sector does not care about the city and both do not care about public opinion.”5 / “These three entities have a lack of communication on all vital issues.”6

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Figure 5 A democratic urbanism becomes ever more urgent when considering the decaying Soviet districts such as Gldani, which cannot be maintained and upgraded through market systems alone.

into an idealised and abstracted consensus, reducing its political potential10. To move from reactionary to meaningful and transformative participation between urban actors, the voids between them must be bridged, built on an acceptance of the antagonism inherent to their plurality.

Whilst this urban politics would be dense with contradiction and conflict, it is essential in its ability to open up space in which a more egalitarian and inclusive city could be imagined and created. Whilst van Assche et al. suggest that the power of representation must be functional in Tbilisi (through a stabilised political system) before citizen participation can be integrated into urban governance processes11, Žižek would argue that a true political intervention ‘changes the very framework that determines how things work’;12 participation between a diverse strata of actors can serve to undermine the existing system of governance and offer alternative possibilities.

The practice of agonistic urbanism in Tbilisi is contingent on two things. Firstly, the provision of spaces for conflictual public encounter and exchange that Swyngedouw and Mouffe advocate, and secondly, the establishment of a bridging, responsive network between urban actors and their particular concerns. The latter is vital in releasing urban conflicts (and actors) from their isolated singularity 10 Protests to particular urban issues are often proclaimed as signs of a healthy democracy, and City Hall / government claim to be responding accordingly, but many local activists were convinced that their actions had too often been in vain. They were only listened to when it was politically beneficial to do so.

11 This is the conclusion of their paper on citizen participation in Georgian planning. van Assche et al. ‘Changing Frames: Citizen and Expert Participation in Georgian Planning’. (as previous) 12 Slavoj Žižek. The Ticklish Subject - The Absent Centre of Political Ontology.

(London: Verso. 1999)

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and connecting them conceptually, and the former is required to allow these antagonisms to confront one another in a symbolic and spatial political arena. A network of this kind would make apparent and visualise the diversity and complexity of conflict in Tbilisi’s urban politics, which must then be facilitated by space (both material and metaphorical) that grounds it in the physicality of the city and allows the negotiation of its contradictions. These spaces are not centralised, but a ‘multiplicity of discursive surfaces’13 across a spectrum of scales and platforms which are in constant flux. This arena must allow representation and participation to meet, conflicting agendas to negotiate and antagonism between a diverse network of actors to be manifested, creating a common discourse. To transcend the potential paralysis of hostility, this antagonism must be mediated through frameworks and spaces that aim to reach productive resolutions, moving beyond antagonism to an agonistic urbanism.

Each of Tbilisi’s recent urbanism epochs has failed due to, in part, the dominance of a hegemony that has narrowed the actor field and thus suppressed plurality and antagonism.

If Georgia is committed to the democracy project, then it seems an apt moment to consider widening and diversifying this field of actors to allow a polyvocal, conflictual urban politics to emerge. This plethora of formalised and scalar conflicts, connected by a responsive network and hosted by designed dissensual spaces, could constitute a truly democratic, agonistic urbanism.

13 Mouffe. ‘Artistic Activism and Agonistic Spaces.’ (as previous)

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Tbilisi, Georgia 05 May 2017

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ARCHITECTURAL AGENCY The event seeked to provoke a critical discussion around various thematics introduced in the exhibition, with an emphasis on architecture’s potential in enriching Tbilisi’s urban, political and social contexts.

The discussion explored three thematics: 1. Civic architecture Considering the particular context of Tbilisi, the aim is to examine the forces involved in shaping civic architecture, explore how these can be negotiated with external pressures, and investigate ways in which citizens can become more active in realising civic architecture.

2. Transient architecture With Tbilisi’s transient architecture as a point of departure, the objective is to question the relationship between formality and informality in the city, consider the mediation of the conflicting aspirations of the market, state and citizens, and explore the convergence of heritage and development.

3. The agency of the architect The intent is to consider the role and agency of the architect in Tbilisi, explore how this role could be expanded and challenge the strategies put forward in the exhibition.

Panel members (left to right on photograph): Natalia Nebieridze - CAMPUS studio / Real Laboratory for Future Urban Planners / Material Hunters Giorgi Gabunia - Advisor for Sustainable Development, Tbilisi City Hall Levan Kalandarishvili - Tbilisi Forum for Architecture/ Institute of Georgian Architects Joseph Salukvadze - Tbilisi State University / City Institute Georgia Levan Asabashvili - Urban Reactor Chair Benjamin Wells - KADK Anders Hilbert - KADK 87

1.

Civic architecture

Tbilisi has a vibrant architectural landscape, with a rich history of civic architecture: buildings for the city and it’s inhabitants, with the purpose of supporting civic life and civil society. However, the character and functions of such buildings are - on a global scale - changing due to economic and political pressures. Considering the particular context of Tbilisi, the aim is to examine the forces involved in shaping civic architecture, explore how these can be negotiated with external pressures, and investigate ways in which citizens can become more active in realising civic architecture.

Some of the exhibition projects explore the agency of architecture in building communities and enhancing the city through public space. What role does architecture play in representing a Tbilisi public? How is public space perceived and valued in Tbilisi? How can architecture integrate and protect public space as integral to the idea of the city?

Giorgi Gabunia (GG) This question, and most questions of architecture and space in Tbilisi, must be considered like this. There was the Soviet era, there was the nineties, and there is now. Understanding the complexities of these periods is crucial in discussing the issue of public space in Tbilisi.

During the Soviet era there was a perception of public space, but during the nineties this disappeared. People locked themselves inside their doors they were not thinking about what was happening outside. People preferred their garages to public space, to have somewhere to lock their cars. Safety was first, not life quality. Now this is changing of course, and people are wanting more and more, which is why we are now in a position where we have a lot of cars, traffic, pollution, and a complete lack of public space.

From City Hall’s perspective, we realise we need much more public space, but we have no land in our ownership and therefore it is impossible to create new spaces - we need a strategy for creating a public realm within existing spaces in the city.

Joseph Salukvadze (JS) I completely agree that there is a certain perception that during the Soviet period everything was public - as if. Everything was state owned and poor people were desperate to have something private.

Our research undertaken for the new masterplan suggests that there are three things needed to construct a ‘civic’ city.

Firstly we do indeed need more public space - but we have a situation where

everything is privatised, and most of the spaces which used to be public have now either gone completely or they are under private ownership, and it is very difficult to touch them as they are under protection rights which we cannot violate.

However, there is a lot of space outside the existing built up area which could be used to create new green public spaces.

We have a market economy - and quite a liberal one because we don’t have strict regulations - and developers are running outside of the difficult urban spaces in the centre to construct on these greenfield sites. This must be stopped.

Secondly, we must remember that Tbilisi is a stagnant city. The population is not growing fast and today in the city there is 100,000 less people that there was at the end of the Soviet period. Guidelines suggest 10sqm of green space per person, yet we have 3sqm. This suggests that we can afford to empty out some of the spaces within the centre of the city to increase urban quality.

The third thing is polycentrism. Tbilisi is currently a mono centric city, however over time some other centres have emerged and this must be encouraged, as it encourages a less dense and more evenly spread city. It also allows for the connection of new centres through green spaces, and encourages the protection of areas such as the Hippodrome.

Levan Asabashvili (LA) When discussing public space we must somehow differentiate.

If we think about the use of public space we must also think about different classes, as different classes use public space differently.

When we talk about the privatisation of small garages, we must remember that this is nothing compared to the public space being developed by large construction companies. This notion of public space can be further categorised - there is political public space, there are state public spaces, there are local public spaces… in poor communities public space is used very differently as people use it as a common ground - an extension of their homes.

Only when we consider these multiple dimensions can we then be more scientific.

Levan Kalandarishvili (LK) This is a city, and the public should decide. Civil society should decide what is best for the city. Architects and planners can draw everything but we should still only select the best of them, like in this exhibition, to present to society.

The reason we are losing so many public spaces is because we are not a society strong enough to decide what we want.

LA That is exactly what I also wanted to add. But when discussing civil society we are not considering the whole picture of society because we have to admit that we are a class society.

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LK But we can not classify ourselves so easily - ‘he is an anarchist, he is a capitalist’ LA Of course but we must define what is civil society - the urban middle class?

We are a class society - we have a large underprivileged urban poor and we have very privileged urban citizens, and they all use public space differently and have different requirements.

Natalia Nebieridze (NN) Actually I agree with most of the comments but I just wanted to add that we architects love public space and we see these spaces as a beautiful and liveable part of the city, as inherent to what makes a city. But in this context we always criticise people and society that they are not caring for their public space.

For example I criticise my neighbours a lot when they are not cleaning their entrance or putting out their garbage.

Yes we are right to criticise them, but we are looking from the perspective of the architect and the professional. I think we must also try to understand why they act like that - because there was a time, Mr Levan would agree, when Tbilisi was a very strong society with lots of interesting processes going on, and after 70 years of the Soviet era, everything changed.

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Benjamin Wells (BW) Then let us discuss how we could attempt to improve this situation, and take steps towards finding what kind of public space the city needs and how it could be realised?

NN I would add that in my neighbourhood we tried to make some changes, but it was impossible to find the right person to whom you could speak to as a citizen.

The service of City Hall is so convoluted and so centralised that it is impossible to get anywhere - this must be improved.

Furthermore, we need different strategies for different areas.

In Old Tbilisi public space is one thing, in the Soviet districts it is another thing, and in areas from the nineties it is something else a total mess.

Each of these areas needs a special approach, and maybe we need to ask what the people that live there consider to be public space.

GG We now have a situation where people are buying luxury apartments in the most polluted parts of the city - giving

the worst example to other people around. Public awareness of the health implications and the importance of public space is key.

LA One more thing to say about this class issue if you’ll allow me, because there are also many people that have looked into this ‘environmental justice’. And as a response to the comment that rich people move towards the centre, we also have to acknowledge that these people have better healthcare possibilities, they go to the doctor more often, they eat better food.

GG They still breath.

LA They breath, but it impacts less. We also have lower classes living in the city centre who breath the same air but it affects them more.

GG

We all breath the same air.

LA But it is not just a respiratory issue. It is about malnutrition, its about food, healthcare, life quality, its about housing quality. Its a complex issue.

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2. Transient architecture A particular Tbilisi vernacular has evolved through the practice of citizens directly adapting their homes and localities. Such practices have contributed to creating an architectural landscape which is transient, evolving and in flux. With Tbilisi’s transient architecture as a point of departure, the objective is to question the relationship between formality and informality in the city, consider the mediation of the conflicting aspirations of the market, state and citizens, and explore the convergence of heritage and development.

Tbilisi is famous for the Kamikaze loggia, a vernacular that seems to represent citizens taking an active role in adapting the city, but this seems at odds with current modes of urbanisation, house building and regulation of the state. Should this ‘informality’ be encouraged, celebrated and protected, or is it conflicting with the aspirations of the city?

JS Ok, let me start.

During the Soviet era, the Georgian communist government allowed citizens to participate in the improvement of their living conditions. The government realised the benefit of this, and it envisaged planning and enlargement of living space by means of state construction agencies, but soon after the Soviet Union collapsed and with it the Soviet management structures, and people started to build whatever way they wanted.

This as a sign of the social resilience of the population, developing a way to improve their living conditions.

In the small Soviet times, several generations would live together in standard apartments, and therefore extending their property was the only way they could improve their situation.

LK I myself am living in such heritage, lets say, of the nineties. It is a kind of heritage you know, and it is difficult as

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inhabitants to discuss the important of upgrading these spaces.

LA I think these crazy extensions around Tbilisi show, most of all, the crisis of a housing shortage.

I think it is a very interesting point, and it needs more research. Is it true that these extensions have already outlived their exploitation period and should be either destroyed or reconstructed. Too often we destroy, and this causes massive destruction to neighbourhoods, with huge negative social effects. So when we talk about Kamikazee loggias, we have to integrate into a much bigger debate - like what are their results and what do they contribute to the city? For now they are only stigmatised by the authorities in power.

NN In Tbilisi there are often many people living in the same family house. They add many many new parts and in a way it is really interesting to see because you see many layers, you see everything about these people, these places talk about their owners, but there is of course a question about how comfortable it is to actually live here.

LA The problem is that there is not enough social housing, and all these self built and self help projects are a phenomenon that came from the seventies when neoliberal policies took hold.

I think we should be able to rely on, or at least encourage, the state to take on its own role of providing decent housing for its citizens.

JS This phenomenon shows a reaction of the population to the economic conditions of the time, which replaced urban mobility. Normally if people are not happy with their residence they move to somewhere else, but this was mobility done by the people within their own homes. So when we talk of demolishing all of the extensions that we have, we must remember that we are destroying years of mobility.

3. The agency of the architect The exhibition challenges the traditional role of the architect, and proposes to consider the architect as an agent of change. In this way the architect becomes an activist, aiming to transcend from a reactionary mode to an active and prescriptive one. With this proposition in mind, the intent is to consider the role and agency of the architect in Tbilisi, explore how this role could be expanded and challenge the strategies put forward in the exhibition.

LK

Many people in Tbilisi think that architects are bad people.

This is wrong. But we cannot put so much pressure on the role of architect the architect is just one element within a big chain. Of course as architects we have our own responsibility, a huge responsibility, to make a good project.

We must then promote that project you must explain to the people that are reviewing the project that you are right.

The most difficult thing is that many ‘right’ projects are not chosen because people to do not understand them.

This is of course not only a Georgian problem, this is a problem everywhere.

We used to have an architect within each region, who acted for that neighbourhood’s interests, but now architects work on projects anywhere, and they do not communicate - this is a mistake. We are no longer speaking.

The city is now built without communication - and look where we are. Each person has a responsibility

to do what they think is right, and to communicate that.

NN You said that architect are bad guys in Tbilisi - I think this is the root of the question of architecture in Tbilisi.

I would say that to be a ‘good’ architect, to be an agent for the city, as an architect or as an urban planner, we must really start with education. I have been studying in several schools of architecture in Tbilisi and there are so many real and brutal mistakes in teaching. For example we have many Soviet era architects who only ever used concrete construction, and they are now teaching students who, no surprise, are only using concrete.

Now we need a totally different approach to the city but architects do the same as their grandfathers did.

So we must change the system of teaching architecture.

GG Another major problem in Tbilisi is that we do not have a high standard of certification for architects, and we also do not yet have proper building codes,

so we have many bad architects building many bad buildings. The profession of an architect in many cases is perceived as a render maker who knows how to get a permit at city hall – almost not connected to art and science. It then takes City Hall a very long time to react as we must carry out research, reports and before trying to change policies. The hope is therefore within raising public awareness, and for citizens to demand a change in architecture.

JS

Architects must answer the demands of society. And to do this we must meet each other, like we are today.

Not just every five or ten years to discuss a big issue like the masterplan. There must be a public institution discussing all proposed development, otherwise we will never have the right understanding of what we must do for the city.

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