Should Public Space Teach Us the Moral Dimensions of Sexual Desire?

Introduction

"The ancient Greek," writes Richard Sennett, "could use his or her eyes to see the complexities of life. The temples, markets, playing fields, meeting places, walls, public statuary, and paintings of the ancient city represented the culture's values in religion, politics, and family life. It would be difficult to know where in particular to go in modern London or New York to experience, say, remorse. . . Nor is it easy to conceive of places that teach the moral dimensions of sexual desire, as the Greek learned in their gymnasiums—modern places, that is, filled with other people, a crowd of other people, rather than the near silence of the bedroom or the solitude of the psychiatrist's couch" (1990, xi).

Should we take Sennett literally? On the one hand, if remorse may be difficult to experience in New York, there may be a chance for that experience elsewhere even today, assuming—and it is a big assumption—that remorse remains a valued dimension of the human experience [Figure 1]. On the other hand, when it comes to the moral aspects of sex, it is perhaps wise to be somewhat skeptical of any age. Glass, for example, mentions the closing of gymnasium doors at night as a precaution against the dangers of pederasty (1967). Further reservations come to mind when one observes that the practice of the Greek gymnasium was restricted to males.

Be that as it may, the essence of the question that Sennett raises is whether the traditional role of public spaces in expressing a culture's values, aspirations, and anxieties can be sustained in our time. More broadly, his argument also calls into question the unbridled pusuit of invidual freedom that characterizes our society -- and the implications of that pursuit for urban design.

That traditionally the urban environment has been a mirror of culture is a widely held notion. Kracauer, for instance, views the designed environment as a medium through which the culture manifest itself. "Spatial images," he maintains, "are the dreams of society" (1995, 75). "With cities," writes Calvino, "it is as with dreams: everything imaginable can be dreamed, but even the most unexpected dream is a rebus that conceals a desire or, its reverse, a fear. Cities, like dreams, are made of desires and fears" (1974). Like Sennett, Rykwert prefers to talk of representation, rather than expression, feeling that representation more fully conveys intentionality (2000). His emphasis reminds us that the city not only reflects culture, but also contributes to its formation. In this sense, Rykwert's thought parallels Gadamer's insistence on the ontological function of art, and especially of architecture, as representation of being (1979). [Figure 2.]

In turn, this idea suggests a connection with Heidegger's often cited notion that to "dwell" is the essential act of our living in the world—being implying dwelling and thus building (1952). Indeed, for Heidegger, building, dwelling, and thinking are inextricably interdependent. For him, as for Sennett, splitting these activities from each other only produces fragmentation and alienation. But Heidegger's vision seems centered on the singular building that emerges from the clearing away, the 'making room' (Räumen) which generates space -- hence the temple, the Black Forest farmhouse of his examples. [Figure 3.]

Network Typologies in Pre- and Post-Industrial Cities

In recent work, I have maintained that a typological, rather than a formal, approach to city history is more conducive to understanding the circumstances that govern the shaping of urban spaces. When applied to the city, the typological perspective, originally proposed by Quatremère de Quincy as a part of his redefinition of architecture (Younés 1999), can reveal continuities and discontinuities in urban fabric over time, as well as provide insights into the interdependence of architectural and urban design (Muratori 1959). In this perspective, I have suggested that the paradigm of city-as-network manifested by Fontana's plan of Rome for pope Sixtus V is more fitting to describe the essential characteristics of the industrial and postindustrial city than that implied by Alberti's notion of city-as-home (Francescato 2001). [Figure 5.]

But if we still believe that urban spaces should convey a sense of our existential and metaphysical condition -- that is, a sense of place -- viewing the city as a network raises obvious difficulties for design today. These difficulties stem not from the paradigm of network per se, but from the nature of the specific types of networks that the contemporary city embodies.

What does it mean to talk about cities as networks? The essential trait that differentiates ‘network' from ‘building' is not necessarily, as is sometimes claimed, the presumed dynamic nature of the former versus the static quality of the latter. Rather, the difference involves the aspects of control and time. In building design, there is a high degree of control, as evinced by the fact that working drawings and specifications constitute, in fact, scale models of concrete, physical objects. Moreover, the time it takes for these models to be transformed into specific buildings and spaces, is finite. Taken together, these aspects allow for a high degree of predictability in the configuration of the result.

Networks, on the other hand, operate in conditions of minimum control and over open-ended periods of time. They do not depend on prediction of end-state configurations, but on structural specifications analogous to a syntax. Thus networks are defined by nodes—which can be viewed as origin and destination points—and connectors—which can be conceived as channels for the flow of communication from node to node. Another way to describe this difference is to note that by the time a building has been built, the rules that led to its configuration cease to be significant. In the case of a network, on the contrary, the rules that govern its inception not only persist but are indeed essential to its functioning. Not only do they define the nature of the network, but they also allow for growth, changes, replications, expansions, and so on.

Fontana's plan for baroque Rome clearly portrays these essential qualities of networks. Because of the self-consciousness of that portrayal, it is legitimate to view it as conveying a significant paradigm shift vis-a-vis prior models. However, an informed reading of urban history suggests that even cities that—through the combined effect of their distinct boundaries, unified formal aspects, and relative permanence of their configuration—may appear at first blush as architectural objects, in fact obey the logic of networks more than they do that of buildings. Rykwert, for example, points out that, contrary to accepted views, the cities of the Roman empire were not modeled after military encampments, that is as one-time objects, but the other way around (2000). [Figure 6.]

This interpretation suggests that even the squared off, walled city that looks like a building was in fact the embodiment of a set of rules that created and gave order to a network. Walls, gates, cardo, decumanus, fora, and grid formed a syntax that would allow for growth and development over time. "It was designed to be filled in," writes Sennett of this network (1990, 48). To say it simply, the city has always been more a network than an object. However, with the historical discontinuities that begin in the eighteenth century and the concomitant accelerating importance of communication and transport, viewing the city as a network obviously acquires a relevance that it did not have prior to those events.

In Sixtus and Fontana's time, the functional and ontological roles of the network they put in place supported each other to the point where it is impossible to set them apart. The straight streets connecting major basilicas and monuments, the visual indicators of columns and obelisks, the twin churches greeting pilgrims at the main gate in Piazza del Popolo, all concurred to represent the values the Church of Rome vas interested in conveying. [Figure 7.]

In typical baroque fashion, Rome became the stage on which the counter reformation drama unfolded for all to see. That it could do this so effectively was made possible by two aspects.First, driven by the evolution of trade, commerce, and early capitalism that emerged between the fifteenth and eighteenth century, and by the inception of science, the age of the baroque had become keenly interested in movement. At the scale of the building as much as that of the town, movement and circulation were at the forefront of creative attention.

Second, pedestrians and horses still were the vast majority of the means of transportation and would continue to be until achieving their peak in the eighteenth century (Braudel 1979, vol 2, 349). In practical terms, this meant that the form of the city was able to incorporate movement into the spatial hierarchies that represented social organization and cultural patterns. Indeed, movement through urban space was an integral component of those structures. Thus not only was movement the generator of urban form, but it supported, rather than inhibiting, the representation of the society and the culture of the time. [Figure 8.]

Contrast these aspects of movement in Fontana's network with those of the post-industrial city.

I recently attended a lecture by Leon Krier, in which the architect illustrated ‘new urbanism' principles with images from his design for Poundbury, a British new town. After the talk, an anguished member of the audience, comparing the eviscerated body of the American city to the humanly scaled spaces of Krier's design asked: "Where did we go wrong?" As it turns out, one of my students was sitting next to me at this lecture. In a gesture that parents of young women will instantly recognize, her eyes rolled skyward. "Can you say automobile?" she whispered.[Figure 9.]

As has become the norm, the money we spend is a reliable indicator of priorities. In your internet browser, click on www.bigdig.com and you will find data on the Boston Central Artery project, also known as the ‘Big Dig.' Started in 1991 and to be completed in 2004, this project entails the burying of a ten-lane expressway under the city at a projected cost of 15 billion dollars (17 billion euros). [Figure 11.]

The big dig will, of course, remove a scar in Boston's urban fabric, hide the traffic stream from view, and rekindle the relationship between the city and its waterfront. But its construction is predicated on the notion that ten underground lanes will carry traffic more swiftly and more efficiently a few years from now than six lanes above ground did in 1959 when the current Central Artery was built. [Figure 12.]

Please note, however: It is not that the postindustrial city does not reflect our culture's values. Indeed, it reflects them only too well. Its ontological role, therefore, should not be called into question. Today's public spaces, as such spaces have done since the beginning of social life, continue to function as a mirror in which we see revealed, perhaps even magnified, who we are as a society.

Thus the postindustrial city teaches us the essential traits of the late capitalism that rules our lives. It is a lesson not everyone likes, but we should not blame the mirror for the image it reflects. If we expect public spaces to make our eyes "literally see the fullness of life," as Sennett would (1990, xi), perhaps it is life itself that needs to recover its fullness. If we cannot find places in which to rediscover the cathartic function of remorse, perhaps we need to reconsider the arrogant self-righteousness of our actions and of our relations with others. If it is impossible today to conceive of urban spaces in which to learn the moral dimension of sexual desire, perhaps it is society that needs to discard the attitude of guilty secrecy and exploitative publicity with which it has surrounded sex and reclaim for it a pre-Christian role as a force of public experience and discourse.

The Urban Design of Public Spaces

I have alluded earlier to the view that designed spaces not only reflect, express, and represent social and cultural values, but also actively participate in their formation. If this is so, does design still have the power to help us recover the fullness of life? What typologies can we imagine that will offset the erosion of public space by the machine? How can design contribute to countering social, economic, and political conditions that tend to diminish our humanity? Only the unfolding of history can answer these questions. But even as we acknowledge the difficulty of the recovery, we should not rush to conclude that design is powerless to affect it.

Design has always been immersed in the world of power, politics, and money. In spite of often-heard calls for ‘resistance', it remains enmeshed in the world of capitalism. But design always entails a critique of the past and, even more, a critique of the present. This is one reason why nostalgic attempts to reproduce, unaltered in the present, typologies of the past are likely to fail. To design continues to entail proposing different, unexpected ways of living in the environment—hence different ways of being and thinking. Thus, design both represents us and re-presents ways of living to us. In a world in which many believe that objects are losing their communicative power, it is perhaps unfashionable to focus on this aspect of design. Yet, it may be wise not to dismiss it. For example, among the lessons of the recent terrorist attacks on New York and Washington — most of which we seem to have studiously avoided thinking about — is the extent to which the significance of the targeted buildings was not lost on the terrorists. [Figure 15.]

Architecture in general and that of public spaces in particular may appear as unlikely candidates today for the task of contributing to the regeneration of a sense of rootedness, identity, belonging, and community -- not to mention a more enlightened sexuality. It seems to lack that sense of direct effect on experience that other sectors of life, such as politics, economics, even literature, appear to have. As Benjamin pointed out, we experience architecture "in a state of distraction"(1968, 241). By opposing this state to the concentration that, say, apprehending a painting requires, he seemed to place architecture on a lower, less persuasive level than that of other arts. However, Eco reminds us that this is precisely how the mass media — television, advertising — influence our values, attitudes, and behavior (1968). Would any of us deny that these are, indeed, powerful instruments of persuasion?

Nor are we likely to find solutions in the currently fashionable proposals of the new urbanism, which sidestep the problem altogether by propagating the fiction of pedestrian villages in which ‘walking distance' becomes the generator of urban form. [Figure 17.]

In this context, even if we believe in the enduring power of the architecture of public spaces, we also need to recognize that the realities of postindustrial late capitalism and the domination of the urban networks by transportation and communication technologies pose formidable challenges. This acknowledgment takes us back to the socioeconomic and political realms and to the multidimensional complexity of urban life that the emerging discourse of the ‘smart growth' movement is beginning to confront. Habermas succinctly called our attention to this condition quite some time ago. "The problems of town planning" he wrote, "are not primarily problems of design but problems of controlling and dealing with the anonymous system imperatives that influence the sphere of city life and threaten to devastate the urban fabric" (1982, 13).

Conclusion

For better or worse, the post-industrial city is not the post-automobile city — as the purveyors of postcard-pretty, neo-traditional urbanism would have us believe. The dominance of the network by the automobile, other means of transport, and electronic media is the challenge, not because in the post-industrial city it is impossible to design and build public spaces as distinct episodes, but because, even when successful, such episodes remain fragments unconnected with everyday life — in consequence, more often than not, limited to the choreographed behavior of tourism and consumption. In the quest for economic efficiency, humanistic aspects are inevitably relegated to subservient roles. Thus, to return to Sennett's examples, remorse is thought of as a disposable burden and sexual desire becomes an instrument in the persuasive discourse of the market place, an advertising tool only one step removed from the sordid exploitation of the pornographer.

But there is a growing dissatisfaction with this state of affairs. Habermas' admonition is being taken more and more seriously not only in the realm of cultural criticism from which it emerged, but also in the political and economic domains. Increasingly, the role of "anonymous system imperatives" is being questioned. And in connection with the need to develop sustainable modes of growth, the pursuit of individual benefit is being challenged.

The city and its public spaces remain at the center of these concerns. Norberg-Schulz maintained that to dwell means to address human needs of a collective, public, and private nature (1985, 7). Fundamental to these needs, he believed, is the desire for identification and orientation that designed spaces have traditionally addressed. Today, that remains the task at hand. It is a task to which design can contribute, but which is not likely to be met by design alone.

References