{"id":3070,"date":"2021-03-19T15:27:25","date_gmt":"2021-03-19T14:27:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theurbanmycelium.com\/?p=3070"},"modified":"2023-02-23T14:57:13","modified_gmt":"2023-02-23T13:57:13","slug":"50-shades-of-urbanism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theurbanmycelium.com\/fr\/50-shades-of-urbanism\/","title":{"rendered":"50 shades of urbanism"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Tactical urbanism, new urbanism, sustainable urbanism, circular urbanism, DIY urbanism, collaborative urbanism, landscape urbanism, re-urbanism\u2026 There are a thousand urbanisms! What lies behind these -ism names? And what is urbanism, at the end of the day?<\/p>\n

Cities offer a lot of opportunities, but they also concentrate many environmental, societal and economic challenges. Since the age of the industrial revolution, problems such as gentrification, urban sprawl, shortage of housing, insecurity, social inequity, pollution, the scarcity of natural resources, etc. have appeared in cities. A lot of these problems remain unsolved, while many more are appearing. Urbanism, as the field that studies urbanization and the urban environment, seems to be ineffective at solving contemporary problems. Why?<\/span><\/p>\n

The problems facing cities are \u201cwicked problems\u201d<\/h3>\n

First of all, cities cope with problems of great complexity, with multiple variables. For that reason, Rittel and Webber (1973) say that urban problems are \u201cwicked\u201d and have no standardized solution. In fact, it is impossible to treat one problem (for example, fighting the shortage of housing with the construction of new apartment buildings) without systematically creating new problems elsewhere in the city or in the world (the rise of renting prices for example, the destruction of agricultural land, the impermeabilization of the ground\u2026). Causes and issues are closely interrelated, which requires a more systemic, global approach to solving urban challenges.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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There is no clear definition of what urbanism is<\/span><\/p>\n

As the problems in cities are multiplying, urbanism as a field of study and practice is gaining a lot of attention. However, there is no clear, universal description of what urbanism is. From what I have gathered during my studies, urbanism is a combination of 3 things:<\/p>\n

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  1. It is the study of cities<\/strong> and their geography, economy, politics, sociology and culture, as well as the impact of these forces on the built environment;<\/li>\n
  2. It is a field of practice<\/strong>, with the planning and development of cities and towns;<\/li>\n
  3. It is the way of life<\/strong> which is typical to any town, city or settlement.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    There are hundreds of urbanisms<\/h3>\n

    Adding to this, urbanism comes in many flavours. There are literally hundreds of typologies of urbanism (not all of them scientifically acknowledged), all of which have emerged as an attempt to improve cities. During our Master in Urbanism Studies (at KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm), my colleague and friend Vasilis<\/a> had counted 294 theories about urbanism (there might even be more at this date) which you can find all mentioned in his master thesis, Urbanism in the making: A handbook of survival<\/a>. There would be no point in describing them all; however, I find interesting to identify the dominant trends behind these many approaches.<\/p>\n

    This task has been carried out by different people in academia and practice, including Haas and Olsson (2013). They came up with 5 different categories:<\/p>\n