Perspecta — “Toward New Possibility in the Public Realm, Together”

“A growing body of research demonstrates that the more we interact with people who are different from us, the more innovative and engaged we become, making better decisions and developing successful solutions to complex problems that fuel social and economic progress. Cities are key sites where diverse people come together and conceive these ideas that move the world forward. [1] So what might this mean for the United States, where our urban environments are trending toward fragmentation?

Economic segregation is increasing, with one-third of American families in major metropolitan areas now living in either high- or low-income neighborhoods—a division that is greater than double that of 1970. [2] Further, concentration of poverty is increasing, with the number of high-poverty urban neighborhoods having tripled, and the number of poor people living in them having doubled over that same forty-plus year period. [3]

Multiple overlapping forces are behind these trends; most notably, rising income inequality across the nation and public policies at various levels of government that make it difficult for lower-income families to move into middle and higher-income neighborhoods. [4] Combined, they are producing toxic conditions for individuals, families, and communities. Researchers are accumulating evidence about how the negative effects associated with poverty are amplified when a large fraction of a poor person’s neighbors are also poor—including worse mental and physical health, higher crime, and obstructed economic mobility. Further, as 75 percent of residents in high-poverty US neighborhoods are African American or Latino, these effects disproportionately burden the lives of people of color. [5]

Seeing this growing divide embedded in the shifting fabric of urban America, how can architects and designers proceed? Will we mirror it by sorting ourselves into architects of the rich and architects of the poor? To be sure, there are those who have adapted their practices to the typologies serving first-world luxury lifestyles, focusing their design energy on formal innovation, while others have centered their work on addressing social conditions by building for those in need of the basics. The dominant perception within the discipline is that the former is architecture with a capital “A,” whose creative success hinges on its formal qualities, while the latter’s contribution is socially beneficial but not held to the same creative standard, or sometimes not considered design at all. …

Today, as the challenges in many US urban cores and inner ring suburbs resonate with those of post-war reconstruction and the Great Depression, it is time for architects to explore how current social science and movements for social justice can inform a renewed design avant-garde propelled by public interest. Recognizing that rising income inequality and the concentration of poverty are intertwined crises that ultimately harm everyone, architects can—rather than mirroring society’s widening rifts—discover new possibilities for the discipline and beyond. …”