Editorial: The European City as a Place of Coexistence

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.14195/1647-8681_8_0

Abstract

The European urban institutions have always negotiated a balance between collective control and individual initiative. However, over the last seven decades this balance has been challenged. In the aftermath of World War II, the utopia of the functional city was hijacked to serve the welfare policies of the states sponsored by the Marshall Plan. Both in urban extension as in urban renewal, technocratic planning approaches were encouraged to back up a political program of de-urbanization inspired by the nemesis of the European city, the American suburbia. Eventually, in the 1980s, the paradigm of the state as provider shifted to the paradigm of the state as enabler. The European city became nothing but a commodity where the state performs as facilitator for the consolidation of the hegemony of the markets. Against this background, the articles published in this issue of Joelho offer critical contributions to understand the production and reproduction of approaches to the (re-) definition of the identity of the European city. With insightful approaches springing from different intellectual perspectives, they expand the debate on one of the fundamental achievements of Western civilization: the European city as a place of coexistence.

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Author Biographies

José António Bandeirinha, CES, DARQ, UC

José António Bandeirinha graduated in 1983 as an architect from the Escola Superior de Belas-Artes of Porto. Currently he is full professor in the Department of Architecture at the University of Coimbra, where he completed his PhD in 2002 entitled "The SAAL process and the architecture in April 25th 1974". Having as main reference architecture and the organisation of space, he has been dedicating his work to several subjects — city and urban condition, housing, theatre, culture.  From 2007 until 2011 he held the position of Pro-rector for cultural affairs at the University of Coimbra, and from 20011 until 2013 he was the Director of the College of the Arts at the University of Coimbra. In 2012 he curated the exhibition "Fernando Távora Permanent Modernity”, coordinated by Álvaro Siza. He was the scientific consultant of the exhibition "The SAAL Process Architecture and Participation 1974-1976", curated by Delfim Sardo and organized by the Serralves Museum of Contemporary Art, Oporto, Portugal, in collaboration with the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Montréal, Canada (2014-2015). He is a senior researcher at the Centre for Social Studies of the University of Coimbra. Currently he holds the position of director of the Department of Architecture at the University of Coimbra, which he has held before from 2002 until 2004, and from  2006 until 2007. José António Bandeirinha had been continuously working on the urban and architectural consequences of political procedures, mainly focusing on the Portuguese 20th century’s reality.

Luís Miguel Correia, CEIS20, DARQ, UC

Luís Miguel Correia is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Architecture of the University of Coimbra (DA-UC) and PhD researcher in the Centre for 20th Century Interdisciplinary Studies – CEIS 20. He graduated in Architecture by the DA-UC in 1994. In 2008, he received his Master from the Department of Civil Engineering of UC with the dissertation Castelos em Portugal: Retrato do seu perfil arquitectónico [1509-1949], which was published by Coimbra University Press in 2010. In 2016, he is awarded his PhD by the UC with the doctoral thesis Monumentos, Território e Identidade no Estado Novo: Da definição de um projecto à memorização de um legado. He is author of several articles and communications, with particular research emphasis dedicated to the cultural heritage and to its relationship that, since the eighteenth century, was established with the territory, the landscape and with a certain idea of national identity. Since 1993, he is simultaneously engaged in architectural practice.

Nelson Mota, TU Delft

Nelson Mota is an Assistant Professor at the TU Delft. He graduated in Architecture and received his Master from the University of Coimbra (Portugal). His PhD was awarded by the TU Delft (The Netherlands). Nelson is the author of the book A Arquitectura do Quotidiano (The Architecture of the Everyday) published in 2010. In this book, Nelson investigates the social implications and the spatial configurations of the boundary between the public and the private realm in the definition of the domestic space of Porto’s bourgeoisie in the late 19th century. In 2014 Nelson published his doctoral dissertation, titled “An Archaeology of the Ordinary. Rethinking the Architecture of Dwelling from CIAM to Siza”, where he discusses the contribution of critical surveys on vernacular social and spatial practices to the reconceptualization of housing design from the 1950s until the 1980s. In 2015, Nelson co-edited (with Ricardo Agarez) “The ‘Bread & Butter’ of Architecture: Investigating Everyday Practices”, a thematic issue of the academic journal Footprint. This publication examines the instrumental role of 'salaried' architects and institutional agency in shaping the spatial and social practices of the everyday. Nelson is production editor and member of the editorial board of the academic journal Footprint. 

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Published

2017-12-26

Issue

No. 8 (2017): Ideas and Practices for the European City

Section

Joelho 8 - Editorial

License

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