scholarly journals Strengthening the Social Sustainability of Super-Blocks: Belgrade’s Emerging Urban Hubs

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 903 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aleksandra Stupar ◽  
Predrag Jovanović ◽  
Jelena Ivanović Vojvodić

Focusing on the social aspect of sustainability, this article provides insight into the process of spatial and functional reconsideration of open public spaces in two selected super-blocks in Belgrade, Serbia. Although their spatial typology is similar, one of them was created during the 1960s in New Belgrade, a new administrative center of the city based on the principles of functionalism, while the other one was built during the 1970s, as a part of urban reconstruction conducted in the central areas of Belgrade (Vračar municipality). The beginning of the 21st century has brought new challenges to open public spaces, reflecting the post-transitional changes of the Serbian socio-economic context, as well as the contemporary urban needs of inhabitants. Consequently, both blocks have developed new gathering places for their local communities, although applying two different approaches, spontaneous/informal (New Belgrade) and formal (Vračar). Considering the specificities of both initiatives and the relationship between local communities and the open public spaces of super-blocks, the comparative analysis is conducted in order to identify the occurring social, spatial, and functional modifications, and the achieved level of social sustainability.

SAGE Open ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 215824401982560 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gamal Mohammed ◽  
Noha Mahmoud

This article discusses a new concept that may help professionals and specialists read the “urban code” of Middle Eastern traditional contexts that was developed from the mix of social aspect and spatial morphology, illustrating how these elements are interconnected in a way that highlights the values and qualities and their reflections on the physicality of the city. This urban code envisions and analyses the relevance of the social pattern language of the traditional context to its urban manifestation, leaning on the “edge environment” as a new generative concept. It outlines the relationship between the ideologies buried underneath the walls of the spatial form of traditional built environment such as Cairo and sheds light on those ideologies in a way that helps us read them within the context of modern values pertained to the sense of community. The notion of the edge environment may contribute to design education restoration, preservation, and upgrading processes as design toolkit that employs careful interventions by fine-tuning the edge environment.


Author(s):  
Oleksii Chepov ◽  

The qualitative and clear definition of the legal regime of the capital of Ukraine, the hero city of Kyiv, is influenced by its legislative enshrinement, however, it should be noted that discussions are ongoing and one of the reasons for the unclear legal status of the capital is the ambiguity of current legislation in this area. Separation of the functions of the city of Kyiv, which are carried out to ensure the rights of citizens of Ukraine and the functions that guarantee the rights of the territorial community of the city of Kyiv. In the modern world, in legal doctrine and practice, the capital is understood as the capital of the country, which at the legislative level received this status and, accordingly, is the administrative and political center of the state, which houses the main state bodies and diplomatic missions of other states. It is the identification of the boundaries of the relationship between the competencies of state administrations and local self-government, in practice, often raises questions about their delimitation and ways of regulatory solution. Peculiarities of local self-government in Kyiv city districts are defined in the provisions of the Law on the Capital, which reveal the norms of the Constitution in these legal relations, according to which the issue of organizing district management in cities belongs to city councils. Likewise, it is unregulated by law to lose the particularity of the legal status of the territory of the city. It should be emphasized that the subject of administrative-legal relations is not a certain administrative-territorial entity, but the social group is designated - the territorial community of the city of Kiev, kiyani. Thus, the provisions on the city of Kyiv partially ignore the potential of the territorial community.


Author(s):  
Aled Davies

This book is a study of the political economy of Britain’s chief financial centre, the City of London, in the two decades prior to the election of Margaret Thatcher’s first Conservative government in 1979. The primary purpose of the book is to evaluate the relationship between the financial sector based in the City, and the economic strategy of social democracy in post-war Britain. In particular, it focuses on how the financial system related to the social democratic pursuit of national industrial development and modernization, and on how the norms of social democratic economic policy were challenged by a variety of fundamental changes to the City that took place during the period....


Urban Science ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Marianna Charitonidou

Takis Zenetos was enthusiastic about the idea of working from home, and believed that both architecture and urban planning should be reshaped in order to respond to this. He supported the design of special public spaces in residential units, aiming to accommodate the inhabitants during working hours. This article argues that Zenetos’s design for “Electronic Urbanism” was more prophetic, and more pragmatic, than his peers such as Archigram and Constant Nieuwenhuys. Despite the fact that they shared an optimism towards technological developments and megastructure, a main difference between Zenetos’s view and the perspectives of his peers is his rejection of a generalised enthusiasm concerning increasing mobility of people. In opposition with Archigram, Zenetos insisted in minimizing citizens’ mobility and supported the replacement of daily transport with the use advanced information technologies, using terms such as “tele-activity”. Zenetos was convinced that “Electronic Urbanism” would help citizens save the time that they normally used to commute to work, and would allow them to spend this time on more creative activities, at or near their homes. The main interest of “Electronic Urbanism” lies in the fact that it not only constitutes an artistic contribution to experimental architecture, but is also characterized by a new social vision, promising to resynchronize practices of daily life. An aspect that is also examined is the relationship of Zenetos’s ideas and those of the so-called Metabolists in the 1960s in Japan, including Kenzo Tange’s conception of megastructures. Zenetos’s thought is very topical considering the ongoing debates about the advanced information society, especially regarding the social concerns of surveillance, governance, and sovereignty within the context of Big Data. His conception of “tele-activities” provides a fertile terrain for reflecting on potential implications and insights concerning home-office conditions not only within the context of the current pandemic situation but beyond it as well.


Author(s):  
Minh-Tung Tran ◽  
◽  
Tien-Hau Phan ◽  
Ngoc-Huyen Chu ◽  
◽  
...  

Public spaces are designed and managed in many different ways. In Hanoi, after the Doi moi policy in 1986, the transfer of the public spaces creation at the neighborhood-level to the private sector has prospered na-ture of public and added a large amount of public space for the city, directly impacting on citizen's daily life, creating a new trend, new concept of public spaces. This article looks forward to understanding the public spaces-making and operating in KDTMs (Khu Do Thi Moi - new urban areas) in Hanoi to answer the question of whether ‘socialization’/privatization of these public spaces will put an end to the urban public or the new means of public-making trend. Based on the comparison and literature review of studies in the world on public spaces privatization with domestic studies to see the differences in the Vietnamese context leading to differences in definitions and roles and the concept of public spaces in KDTMs of Hanoi. Through adducing and analyzing practical cases, the article also mentions the trends, the issues, the ways and the technologies of public-making and public-spaces-making in KDTMs of Hanoi. Win/loss and the relationship of the three most important influential actors in this process (municipality, KDTM owners, inhabitants/citizens) is also considered to reconceptualize the public spaces of KDTMs in Hanoi.


2021 ◽  
pp. 188-205
Author(s):  
Julia Stępniewska ◽  
Piotr Zańko ◽  
Adam Fijałkowski

In this text, we ask about the relationship between sexual education in Poland in the 1960s and 1970s with the cultural contestation and the moral (including sexual) revolution in the West as seen through the eyes of Prof. Andrzej Jaczewski (1929–2020) – educationalist, who for many years in 1970s and 1980s conducted seminars at the University of Cologne, pediatrician, sexologist, one of the pioneers of sexual education in Poland. The movie “Sztuka kochania. Historia Michaliny Wisłockiej” (“The Art of Love. The Story of Michalina Wisłocka” [1921–2005]), directed in 2017 by Maria Sadowska, was the impulse for our interview. After watching it, we discovered that the counter-cultural background of the West in the 1960s and 1970s was completely absent both in the aforementioned film and in the discourse of Polish sex education at that time. Moreover, Andrzej Jaczewski’s statement (July 2020) indicates that the Polish concept of sexual education in the 1960s and 1970s did not arise under the influence of the social and moral revolution in the West at the same time, and its originality lay in the fact that it was dealt with by professional doctors-specialists. We put Andrzej Jaczewski’s voice in the spotlight. Our voice is usually muted in this text, it is more of an auxiliary function (Chase, 2009). Each of the readers may impose their own interpretative filter on the story presented here.


2021 ◽  
pp. 79-113
Author(s):  
A.N. Veraksa ◽  
N.E. Veraksa

The review is devoted to the relationship between executive functions and metacognition in the context of a cultural-historical perspective. On the basis of the research carried out over the past 15 years, the commonality and differences of these constructs are shown. Special attention is paid to the development of executive functions and metacognition, their connection with the academic success of children, the role of the social aspect in their formation. The importance of an adult in the directed formation of metacognition and self-regulation is shown, which confirms the provisions of the cultural-historical theory. Within the framework of the cultural-historical paradigm, several mechanisms for the development of executive functions are considered: imitation based on understanding; sign mediation; as well as communication in a social developmental situation. L.S. Vygotsky noted that higher mental functions arise on the basis of real interactions of people, are interiorized, turning into psychological functions. The review showed that one of the most common models of the structure of executive functions is a model that includes such components as “working memory”, “inhibitory control” and “cognitive flexibility”. Based on the analysis, it is possible to assert the influence of J. Piaget’s concept on the development of executive functions. A certain difficulty is caused by the explanation of emotional regulation in the context of metacognitive problems. At the same time, L.S. Vygotsky spoke about the unity of affect and intellect, which suggests the existence behavioral control and, in particular, of emotional processes at the level of metacognitive processes.


2018 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 119-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maryam Nazzal ◽  
Samer Chinder

In Lebanon, the social connections are undeniable and crucial. However, meeting places remain private such as houses, restaurants, malls, and beach resorts. This is mainly due to the shortage of public spaces in Lebanon resulting from lack of planning, regulations and awareness around the right to the city and the importance of public spaces. In main cities where land prices are so expensive, common practice has prioritized the use of land in real estate development, thus trumping other uses such as public and communal spaces.In the late 1990s, Lebanon saw the emergence of malls, which have arguably acted as alternatives to public spaces. Malls, with their wealth of food courts, restaurants, cinemas, and play areas, have become the new downtown for a portion of the Lebanese population. They are also considered safe, which is another important factor.In 2015, the percentage of green spaces in Lebanon has decreased to less than 13%. While the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends a minimum of 9m2 of green space per capita (UN-HABITAT, 2016), Beirut has only 0.8m2.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 64-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alice Creasy ◽  
Matthew Lane ◽  
Alice Owen ◽  
Candice Howarth ◽  
Dan Van der Horst

Against the backdrop of increasingly fragmented and poly-centric urban climate governance, this article examines the establishment of city climate ‘commissions’ as an experimental means of addressing the challenge of climate change at the city-scale. In doing so it addresses the question: What constitutes diversity in voices and perspectives when trying to represent the city as a place for climate action? To answer this question, the article presents an analysis of the Edinburgh Climate Commission’s establishment, drawing on participatory ethnographic research carried out by a researcher embedded within the project team. The account of how this new mode of urban governance was both conceptualised and then put into practice offers a new institutional angle to the literature on urban ‘experimentation.’ Through our reflective analysis we argue that aspirations to ensure pre-defined ‘key’ industries (high carbon emitters) are accounted for in commissioner recruitment, and an over-emphasis on capturing discernible ‘impacts’ in the short term (by involving organisations already pro-active in sustainable development) hindered an opportunity to embrace new perspectives on urban futures and harness the innovative potential of cities to engage with the multifaceted nature of the climate challenge. Furthermore, new insight into the relationship between local authorities and other ‘place-based’ agents of change opens up important questions regarding how to balance the attainment of legitimacy within the political status quo, and the prospect of a new radical politics for urban transformation.


Author(s):  
Ewa Waryś

The article presents the contemporary cultural landscape of the historical workers’ settlements, located within the current administrative boundaries of the city of Katowice. Selected building complexes are standardized in terms of typology and building design, but differ in terms of the conservation status and forms of protection. The aim of the discussion is to show the relationship between the artistic and architectural aesthetics and public spaces related to the industry. The subject matter is an attempt to draw attention to the problem of the conservation status of most parts of the historical complexes of residential buildings in Upper Silesia, their untapped potential and declining values.


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