Barcelona Institute of Architecture History, Theory, and Criticism Department Labor, City, Form: Towards a Common Architectural Language
Seminar paper
Book review: The Concept of the Political, Carl Schmitt, The University of Chicago Press, 2007 Student: Andjelka Badnjar
Prof. Pier Vittorio Aureli Fall term 2010-2011. Barcelona
This paper will try to follow the relationship between politics and labor as deployed in Carl Schmitt’s book The Concept of the Political. The paper follows two constitutive arguments: The first part introduces elements that are hypothetically analogue to the what later Hannah Arendt described as the primary human condition1 . The second part instead is devoted to the influence of liberalism that would be argued as deductive line within the concept. In the cohesion between these two lines (human condition and liberalism), the concepts of the political and labor appear as questionable. 1
Hannah Arendt, The Human Condition, 1958
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Carl Schmitt does not provide any definition of the political. He deals with its nature.2 In order to determinate the very essence of the concept he starts with defining “political categories”3, a term that almost does not repeat again any more. Namely, further discussion on the political is based on terms of criterion. For Schmitt, the consideration of the political is autonomous from other realms of human thought and action, such as moral, aesthetic, religious, economic, etc. These realms are just relatively independent, since all other actions could be traced through the criteria of the political.4 At the moment they start to be decisive, they are becoming political and with no connection within previous human realm. Therefore, they cannot be evaluated by the criteria of its original category, which is the principal for creating a fundamental base to serve the distinction between state and society. In order to potentially determinate the political, for anything from totality of human actions, it is necessary to have the ability for causing the ultimate distinction that political must rest on: the one between friendship and enmity.5This distinction is parallels common antitheses existing in other realms such as the distinction between good and evil in morality, beautiful and ugly in aesthetics, or profitable and unprofitable in economics. But even though Schmitt derives this assumption from mentioned categories6, “” he further insists that this new distinction “can speak clearly for itself” and “cannot be directly reduced to the others.”7 This is final line up to where Schmitt goes in defining the political. All other connotations are just potential scenarios of its essence, and all of 2
Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 19. 3 Id., p. 25. 4 Id., pp. 25, 26. 5 For distinction between terms “enemy” and “foe” relevant for Schmitt’s concept of the political see: Schwab, G., Introduction of The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 10. 6 the question there is whether there is also a special distinction which can serve as a simple criterion of the political, [Where] 7 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 26.
them could be reduced on “distinction between friend and enemy [that] denotes the utmost degree of intensity of a union or separation.”8 Moreover, the split “provides a definition in the sense of a criterion and not as an exhaustive definition or one indicative on substantial content.”9 It is not the content that could be defined, since content might be anything, but the character of the category determined by intensity of an association or dissociation of human beings. This potential association is sovereign, not in the totalitarian meaning, but “in the sense that the decision about the critical situation, [war], must always necessarily reside there.”10 The decision whether there is going to be war or not could be brought only by the actual participants. “Only the actual participants can correctly recognize…”11 There is no norm or law but only one who participates is able to experience and consequently know how to act. The decision is strictly subjective, since it is primary condition of the group. “Each participant is in a position to judge whether the adversary intends to negate his opponent’s way of life and therefore must be repulsed in order to preserve one’s own form of existence.”12 Therefore, the reason of grouping is not any reason, it is the form of existence. Moreover, when talking about pacified globe, Schmitt refers that “there would not be a meaningful antithesis whereby men could be required to sacrifice life, authorized to shed blood, and kill other human beings.”13 Schmitt suggests that in pacified globe, politics is [apparently] impossible, since there is no primary condition of the political: grouping strong enough that establishes choice between life and death. “From this most extreme possibility human life derives its specifically political tension.”14 There is no other justification except for the political condition that could explain “man killing each other”15, and this principle does not derive its argument from any moral
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Id., p. 26. Ibid. 10 Id., p. 27. 11 Ibid. 12 Id., p. 25. 13 Id., p. 35. 14 Ibid. 15 Id., p. 49. 9
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norm or nihilist tendency, since it is not a claim for justice nor call for war, but the very basic nature of human existence. Precisely, the existential attribute of the political is why Schmitt does not define it. It cannot be defined since defining it would entail defining human nature. The concept of the political melts within the totality of human affairs, driven by simple criterion as to make significant distinctions. Its ultimate condition is the survival instinct. Therefore, the concept of the political is not anything alien to human nature but its supreme ruling condition, provoked by simple and intense potential decision between life and death. As existentially decisive it is a primary human necessity,”, and therefore, potentially analogue to the concept of labor.16 But if human labor is the potential base for experiencing and for establishing political as the concept, then why humanity as entity is not supposed to involve or decide within the politics? When Schmitt express that the pair friend / enemy should be understood in its concrete, not metaphoric sense, he also stresses that “least all [it is not to be understood] in a private-individualistic sense as a psychological expression of private emotions and tendencies.”17 Clearly enough, enemy is public, not private. But unlike Marx’s primacy of the social aspects of man above his individuality18, Schmitt refuses the initially individuality, precisely in order not to become social. “No form of order, nor reasonable legitimacy or legality can exist without protection and obedience.”19 By tracing German political science, Schmitt refers to the state as “qualitatively distinct from society and higher than it.”20 So, although the concept of the political is based on existential human condition, the same politics, within the instrumentalization of the concept, is de-familiarized from the same labor.
Because “human nature as well as divine right demands its inviolable observation”21, Schmitt pulls away concept of the political from its origin, from the fundaments on what is based, from the sphere of nature to the sphere of order, arguing for a distrust in man. “The problematic or unproblematic conception of man is decisive for the presupposition of every further political consideration.”22 After following traces from animal fables and Machiavelli’s passions of all kinds consisting inclination toward evil if not checked, Schmitt arrives to the interpretation of Plessner that concept of political cannot be neutralized against irrational life decisions. Finally, he concludes that dominant philosophical thought, including Hegel and Nietzsche, also belong to the side of evil.23 And yet, it is the case and consequence order that occasionally appears as unclear. Is it so because in man’s nature, criterion of friend and enemy is entailed?, or is it because the necessity of friend and enemy division in [Schmitt’s] concept of the political illustrates the problematic nature of man most adequately? Later on, Schmitt writes: “Because the sphere of the political is in the final analysis determined by the real possibility of enmity, political conceptions and ideas cannot very well start with an anthropological optimism. This would dissolve the possibility of enmity and, thereby, every specific political consequence.”24 Oscillating in the dualistic connotations of cause and consequence, Schmitt, predominantly, refers to Hobbes. His state of nature as “a condition of war of every one against every one”25, where everyone can use anything in preserving life against enemy, is recalled in Schmitt’s statement as the basis for protection and obedience. As Strauss noticed in his Notes on The
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“To labor meant to be enslaved by necessity, and this enslavement was inherent in the condition of human life.” Arendt, H., The Human Condition, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1998, pp. 83, 84. 17 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 28. 18 Marx, K., Grundrisse, Penguin Group, England, 1993, pp. 83, 84. 19 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 52. 20 Id., p. 24.
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Id., p. 52. Id., p. 58. 23 Id., pp. 59, 60. 24 Hobbes, T., Leviathan, McMaster University Archive of the History of Economic Thought, ch. XIII: Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as Concerning their Felicity and Misery, p. 80. 25 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 19. 22
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Concept of the Political, Hobbes attempts to overcome state of the nature26, namely human liberty27 within the position of civilization, i.e. with the negation of state of the nature. For Hobbes within this condition where “every man has a right to everything, even to one another’s body” there can be no security to any man. And consequently “it is a precept, or general rule of reason: that every man ought to endeavor peace, and when he cannot obtain it, that he may seek and use all helps and advantages of war.”28 Unlike Schmitt, political concept for Hobbes is abstraction more than negation of the state of nature. It is right of the nature that is abstracted: by all means we are allowed to defend ourselves. Within the political, it is the law of nature that it is left: seek peace and follow it. In the condition where there is no politics, there is no law. For Hobbes, politics should exist because of such nature of man. For Schmitt, such nature of man is the content of politics War and not peace is the political ultimate condition. Hobbes’s antithesis that man is evil and peace is political order is actually a deduction in Schmitt’s case: man is dangerous and a possibility of war is the political concept. Unlike Hobbes’s negation of the state of nature, Schmitt does not renounce to it; moreover he adopts, civilizes and transforms it toward establishing order within it. Such nature of men is ever present condition, always on the same level and it is only how it is cultivated that is distinctive. It is a feature that the content itself does not change, making therefore Schmitt’s thought to seem ultimately unprogressive. Apart from most of modern theories having in common the concept of the process29, he rejects the possibility that man,
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Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 108. 27 Liberty: “the absence of external impediments may take away part of man’s to do what he would”, Hobbes, T., Leviathan, McMaster University Archive of the History of Economic Thought, c. XIII: Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as Concerning their Felicity and Misery, p. 80. 28 Ibid. 29 “The coincidence of Marx’s labor philosophy with evolution and development theories of the nineteenth century…and the historical development of a life process of mankind as a whole-was early observed by Engels, who called Marx “the Darwin of history”…what all these theories have in common is the concept of process,
although assumed as dangerous in his origin, could evolve within the politics. Furthermore, by acknowledging Nietzsche30 Schmitt was, doubtless, very well aware of possibility that it might not be even the issue if man is good or evil. If we speculate with the possibility of these choices all together within Schmitt’s own oscillating view between cause and consequence, then we might think that it is not only that he doesn’t believe man to be unproblematic, but more of that, Schmitt chooses to believe that man is problematic. Acknowledging that his distinction between labor and politics, based on the nature of man, is actually based on his choice of man as problematic, it is easy to turn to the direction of potential bellicose and imperialistic nature of his thought that Strauss slightly attached to Schmitt, noticing that “Schmitt speaks with an unmistakable sympathy of the “evil”, which is “nothing other than admiration of animal power.”31 Based on the content of The Concept of the Political it is not the line that is considered relevant to be followed, nor the very reason of Schmitt’s choice. Namely, two parallel departure points could be traced as relevant for Schmitt’s formation of the concept of the political. Apart from Schmitt’s consideration on politics based on human condition discussed up until now, the other constitutive line is the experience of liberalism. This experience will be argued as potential reason for Schmitt to choose man to be problematic. Schmitt traces the foundation of liberalism through historical stages of the last four centuries. He names them “central domains”. For Strauss, Schmitt wants to return particularly to Hobbes in order to “strike at the root of liberalism.”32Although Strauss sees Hobbes as “author of the ideal of civilization” and consequently the very “founder of liberalism”33, it is Hobbes who uses the term awe when describing common power that men
which was virtually unknown prior to the modern age.” Arendt, H., The Human Condition, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1998, p. 116. 30 Nietzsche, F., On the Genealogy of Morals, Vintage Books, 1989 31 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, pp. 113, 115. 32 Id., p. 108. 33 Id., p. 107.
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need to be kept in, in order to avoid a condition of war. 34 Furthermore, he points to a kind of masochistic nature of human where “men have no pleasure … in keeping company where there is no power able to overawe them all.”35 Therefore, labor, that hypothetically has the highest level of freedom within the state of nature, needs to be controlled by authority. For Hobbes, this situation does not necessary exclude the right to labor to be involved within the process. When he argues that desires and passions of men need to know the law that forbids them, he also underscores that no law can be made “till they have agreed upon the person that shall make it.”36 It is not men that decide about law, but they decide about the person who shall make it. Being aware of historical situation that Hobbes worked in, his consideration of involvement of labor within the politics is on a potentially higher level than in Schmitt’s concept. Further on, Schmitt pursues the distinction between labor and politics from another angle: the manifestation of liberalism causes depolarization and neutralization. Ultimately, it is the plurality that is “denying the sovereignty of the political entity.”37 There is no possibility for having strong divisions if each one has its own individual and what is more crucial different from each other- endeavors. The more the number rise, the more the political gets weaker. Paradoxically, for Schmitt freedom of labor is becoming the antithesis of the concept of the political. At least, ruled labor apparently excludes the concept of the political. Eventually, the issue is not what labor is, but the numerosity of its condition. For Schmitt it is nothing more than mass culture based on bourgeois society. Tracing stages in which “intellectual life has had four different centers”38 , Schmitt follows the rise of bourgeoisie through the development of liberal society. “There are four great, simple, secular stages…proceeding to the theological to the metaphysical domain, from there to the 34
Hobbes, T., Leviathan, McMaster University Archive of the History of Economic Thought, c. XIII: Of the Natural Condition of Mankind as Concerning their Felicity and Misery, p. 77. 35 Ibid. 36 Id., p. 78. 37 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 41. 38 Id., p. 81., The Age of Neutralizations and Depoliticizations (1929)
humanitarian-moral, and, finally, to the economic domain.”39 Schmitt stresses the word simple as they cannot be misunderstood, interpreted in various meanings. He uses simple almost as negation in advance to a condition of a relativity that liberalism could contain. Furthermore, an unprogressive character of his thought appears also relevant in the sequence he provides. So, the shift is not meant as a theory of cultural, neither as law. It is not rhythm, nor continuous line of progress.40 It is only, a center that had changed, and consequently, the condition how political thought has been shaped. The main sources from which the political emerged had shifted, but the concept of the political, itself, remains a constant and ever-present fact. And as such the concept of the political is present even today41, but formed worst than ever. “Economization of intellectual life”42 have happened to an active elite, “the clerc of the nineteenth century, (first and foremost Karl Marx), became economic expert.”43 It is significant to notice here that Schmitt refers to Marx as an economic expert. Comparing the structure of their concepts, Marx, also, introduced a similar division to stages in all forms of society where “there is one specific kind of production which predominates over the rest, whose relations thus assign rank and influence to the others.”44 Surely that Schmitt was aware that, for Marx, a production was more than one discipline term. As a constitutive part of unity containing humanity as a subject and nature as an object it is an essential condition of Hegelian whole. Economic categories were, precisely, what determined politics through whole history of humanity and that finally arrived to the point where their relationships within “modern bourgeois society, [are] precisely the opposite of that which seems to be the natural order or which corresponds to historical development.”45 On the other hand, something as political economy is not considerable at all within Schmitt’s narrative, since as far as anything comes near to politics, it is no longer economy but the politics itself. Eventually, Schmitt, unlike Marx, has not 39
Id., p. 82., The Age of Neutralizations and Depoliticizations (1929) Ibid. 41 1932. 42 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 84. 43 Id., p. 87. 44 Marx, K., Grundrisse, Penguin Group, England, 1993, p. 107. 45 Ibid. 40
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considered what qualitative character of political formation is, but how strong its constitution is. Schmitt stresses economics, not because he is concerned with any constitutive element, but precisely because he blames it as the central domain of economy [and Marx within it, although on the opposite side] that served as a final mediation toward the fact that the concept of the political, finally, lost its clerc.46 It is not because of the appropriation of instruments for production or labor power that Schmitt refers to bourgeois society, but because his dialectical and apt need between flexibility and order. The bourgeois, “an individual who does not want to leave the apolitical riskless private sphere”47, is not the one who could be compelled to fight against his will in the name of state, or any higher order but his own private interest.48 Consequently, the bourgeoisie’s primary interest within the realm of politics is that it should be flexible enough in order to be hindered and controlled, but also planned in providing government for “securing the conditions for liberty and eliminating infringements on freedom.”49 Precisely comfort and dialectic are excluding decisive character of the concept of the political. Within the final mediation of liberal society - combination of an economy and rising technology - struggle turns into procedure, the will into tendency or calculation, politically united people50 into partially industrial concern, partially a mass of consumers, and very core of human existence in production and consumption.51 But general tendency of neutrality of intellect is just an illusion. Since politics is congenitally state of the human “even anti-political system serves existing or newly emerging friend-and-enemy groupings and cannot escape the logic of political”52 Moreover, liberalism
has a specific political meaning that uses humanity as ideological instrument. And - as Schmitt remarkably traces - within the oscillating poles of ethics and economics, and development of technology with the image of equality, liberalism evades visibility of its political condition.53 Technology - which precisely because it serves all, it is not neutral -is used as a mean in order to keep humanity unaware of this fact, and thus, apparently, neutral and non-political. Man appears as oscillating between labor and playfulness54 and finally ambivalent and politically uninterested. The present experience of liberalism is a constitutive vector in Schmitt’s concept of the political and derives from population. Another one is superimposed to the concept of population and derives from the human condition. Within these two elements there exists a potential contradiction following Schmitt’s thought. Consequences that political concept of liberal society is followed with, present as condition without elite, struggle, will and intensity, is the reason why Schmitt chooses man to be dangerous in order to finally de-familiarize labor from the political. The concept of the political is endangered by such essence of labor and because of that it exists Schmitt’s deep entrust in the potential of population for the decisive moment. It is order that is Schmitt’s ultimately concern, since order defines quality. Although the concept of the political is the existential element within the human condition, it is not given to human not to jeopardize human order.
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For notion of term clerc within Schmitt’s concept see: Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 86. 47 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 62. 48 Id., p. 71. 49 Id., p. 70, 71. 50 Schmitt never uses term society within describing who constitutes groups 51 Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007, p. 72, 84. 52 Id., p. 79.
Id., p. 88. “The same trend to level down all serious activities to the status of making a living is manifest in present day labor theories, which almost unanimously define labor as the opposite of play. As a result, all serious activities, irrespective of their fruits, are called labor, and every activity which is not necessary either for the life of the individual or for the life process of society is subsumed under playfulness.”, Arendt, H., The Human Condition, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1998, p. 127. 54
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Bibliography: 1. Arendt, H., The Human Condition, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1998 2. Hobbes, T., Leviathan, McMaster University Archive of the History of Economic Thought 3. Marx, K., Grundrisse, Penguin Group, England, 1993 4. Nietzsche, F., On the Genealogy of Morals, Vintage Books, 1989 5. Schmitt, C., The Concept of the Political, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2007
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part 2/ collective structures. form: legibility of collective structure’s formation. urban cluster. Josep Anton Acebillo
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Portfolio: text In order to explain the influences that have affected this material several points from academic year are worth mentioning. First of all investigation on how things get relevant: the question that Chus Martínez addressed in lecture on 15th of November titled as: ART, CULTURE AND THE NEED TO STOP MAKING SENSE. How does relevant meaning create space of importance appears as questionable apart from the subject of relevance. However, process of creation is precisely where anomaly happens. Namely, the culture becomes overly obsessed with the meaning, so it emerges as too fixed and inelastic. Consequently, by excess of “meaning” what is relevant is becoming unclear. One of the proposals on how culture might react toward the excess is referential to Wittgenstein renouncement of dialectic: of what is true and false. To think in simple and direct relationships is the argument Chus Martínez addresses as compatible with process of unlearning. Unlearning appears as a method how to reverse the way we organize knowledge from producing to articulating it. Speaking about articulation of knowledge, clarity of terms and their application emerge as essential. Arguing for the essence of term of interdisciplinary - so referential to the contemporary cultural production Isabel Valverde referred on Ronald Barthes’s observation that real consequence of interdisciplinary approach is not meeting point of disciplines, but creation of new object. New object understood within discipline of architecture imposes following question: what the new object is? What it is relevant for? Does it need to be alien or could it be historically recognizable? Within the seminar that Pier Vittorio Aureli gave on: LABOR, CITY, FORM - Towards a Common Architectural Language - the form is addressed as the dialectical relationship between two categories: the concept of the political and the concept of the labor. Argument is oscillating between two images: one of Greek polis and another one of Archizoom’s Stop City. In between these two historical moments architectural form has been developing not as consequential toward politics, but as crucial tool used for organization of labor. However, if form had had such a crucial role, than could it be possible that same form might be used in more or less favor of labor?
Following the argument of the seminar, the seminar paper – book review of “The Concept of the Political”- tried to understand form by understanding basic of the concept of the political itself. It is important to understand political not through one-discipline isolated term, but as supreme, decisive and as such essential condition of human nature. Main contradiction of Carl Schmitt’s concept of political appears precisely in relationship between his attempts to define political as such human condition, and at the same time as a concept that is working almost as an antithesis of political experience of liberal society: one oscillating between poles of economics and aesthetics. As a consequence of too many particularities and private interest domains emerging from liberalism, political perception - that is basic human feature- becomes inert, passive, de-familiarized from the human nature and consequently from the culture. As questionable appears what is influence and level of perception, but also what is level of control, of one entity formation within liberal society? And how it may or may not bring – collective project?
Collective [mega] structures The object of interest of this material is: collective structure. Historically, similar term was introduced by Fumiho Maki in his “Investigations in Collective Form”. According to Maki the megastructure appears as one possibility of collective form. “The megastructure is a large frame in which all the functions of a city or part of a city are housed […] It is like the great hill on which Italian towns were built.”[Investigations in Collective Form, p.47] It is important here to note the issue of size as predominant characteristic. This is logical if the megastructure is understood as an adequate answer for resolving the issue of sprawl and growth. At the same time it reduces possibilities for these structures to be applied in more common use. Moreover, it tends to overcome the issue - what is the content for structuring - as far as if it is big enough. Still, the megastructure might be understood within wider typology. It might belong to the family of collective structures that could be mega, but also really small objects. By being extra large, they adopt one level more of complexity, but the stay primarily defined by collection of particular structural element they are built of. The main feature of collective structures is their structural element and in that sense they are modular objects. This
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structural element defines character of collective structure, not only in terms how to make its size to stand, but trough the question what the structure is made off; what is the qualitative definition of structural element? Consequently, this module is not primarily tool for largeness, but generator of qualitative character of structure itself. Collection of what structural element defines ultimate character of collective formation? What structural element is relevant for it? Collective structures tend to be defined through next topics: -
qualitative character of structural element they are
made off bidirectional relationship with programmatic organizational pattern they are applied to -
form: legibility of collective structure’s formation
Qualitative character of structural elements is predominantly defined by issues of: environment and production of energy, urban mobility and ecology.
Bidirectional relationship with programmatic organizational pattern they are applied to There is one primary collective structure that is formed objectively, based on scientific research on relevant issue: in particular case on circulation of water within building. This structure is primary influence. It is alien and as such it is applied on space and program as first influence on organization. On the other hand this structure is modified by the structure of programmatic organizational pattern itself. This reversal modification is possible by the secondary element of the structure. Namely, collective structure is divided to primary and secondary element. Primary element originally organizes the space. Secondary element that is fulfillment is the structure to be modified by the organizational pattern. Comparing to characteristics of the megastructure emerged in 1960s with “plugged in” modules, here the secondary element works not as addition, but as part of the collective structure itself. Structure becomes consequence of dialectics between influence on organization and being influenced by organization. As such, generic structural system is becoming hybrid and particular object.
Although the space is manly resolved by dialectic between organization and structure, collective structures do not tend to completely resolve the space. They act as predominant. This direct application of programmatic organization on structures does not have tendency to make organizational pattern transparent, tough apart from resolving it functionally – it has tendency to stress its appearance. Namely, the public space works in collective structures as follows: Through tectonic of primary structure: it follows structure and, at the same time, it starts to appear within the program. through perception and functional organization of secondary structure
Form: legibility of collective structure formation Comparing to megastructures emerged in 1960s, collective structures are just theoretically capable for infinite growth. Although their structural modulation gives them such possibility, their formal articulation reduces level of gentrification within them. So geometry of their formation is additional component that influences collective structure. Regarding the relationship to the ground the collective structures are developing predominantly vertically. Namely, the reason if collective structure needs to emerge could be mainly identified with issue of footprint. In general, occupation of footprint does not work coherently with any of the issues of: growth, ecology, environment and energy. If collective structures are sized as megastructures, and if they are predominantly vertical then issue of mobility within verticality becomes prevalent. In same way as the energy transmission mobility becomes the main qualitative feature of structural element. Each of the modules contains point of connection [“vertical plaza”] by which it is connected with main system of mobility that develops in parallel through the height, addressing different systems of transportation such as: highway, rail, hectometric and pedestrian. The position of connection point in structural element and its proximity to the main system of transportation is what makes the elements differentiating between each other. By different displacement of mobility pattern influenced by application of program, the collective structure becomes distorted from the inside. Namely, complexity of collective structures emerges by distortion within it;
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Working in symbiosis with generic element that is applied and afterwards distorted by programmatic organization, collective structures behave in between generic grid and particular object. Within the scope architectural design deals with them, they are “unfinished”, supportative, but recognizable. Level of recognition they achieve by their formal determination is relevant only to what they do. If in the future these structures might be applied also as generators of new ecologies - with all controversy it brings - then they might connect two ecologically disturbed zones. They are formally determined as connector of two points, but at the same time they are leading to formal dissolution of their inner design. Their secondary structure is self designed, letting them oscillate in between rigid and spontaneous formation. By choosing to deal with architecture in more apparently “constructional” sense, collective structures tend to skip devotion toward excess of architectural design and to move center of attention from the agglomeration of methods to the precise point of content: what do they perform for.
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