Radical Democracy in Architecture and Urban Planning

Politics is made in urban space: through gentrification, authoritarian security measures and adaptation to investment interests. Also, profit is made: from housing shortage, from “concrete gold”, from urban space as a capital investment.

Against this background, Gabu Heindl discusses concepts and strategical problems of an architectural policy in the city that is oriented towards democracy and solidarity: as a building and planning policy and always also as a policy of conflict. This highlights an architectural activity that positions itself critically and enters into alliances with social movements.
In this book a radical democratic approach to architecture is formulated with a scrutinizing look at the realized utopias (and lost futures) of 1920s Red Vienna and on the basis of the (self-)critique of participatory planning, yet in alliances with movements from below. Between theoretical arguments and practices of intervention, the aim is not only to defend but rather to expand the spaces and scope of democracy, especially so in times of its crisis.