Cities 07

Prevalence of Slums - Mike Davis By far, the most comprehensive look at inequality yet explored in this class! Without a focus on theory, this reading was much easier to grasp than DeBord…and most certainly a more hard-hitting reality than Foucault. Davis has become, for me, one of the most influential contemporary writers (outside of Castells) that we’ve covered in this class. It could be his focus on urban reflection, in particular the inequalities, power struggles and these actualities in design. Throughout much of my urban studies learning, I’ve asked myself – what’s Russia up to? Being caught in second world territory, I assumed it to be stagnant because of its political state, but it’s such a vast amount of land I couldn’t imagine it had no influence on urban studies, although I’d seen none. Finally I hear something, even if the news is bad. “The fastest growing slums are in the Russian Federation (especially ex-“socialist company towns” dependant on a single, now-closed industry) and the former Soviet Republics, where urban dereliction has been bred at the same stomach-churning velocity as economic inequality and civic disinvestment.” (pg.24) The side note on socialist company towns reminded me of Michael Moore’s Roger and Me film on General Motors closing a plant in Flint Michigan. The effects were astronomical on the whole city, being that so many residents were employed there. The fall of the industrial age, explored in Castells as well, has left a huge void in blue-collar America and, apparently, the Russian Federation. My brother, a mindful architect, once brought up that many of the harshly impoverished Third-World population are living far more sustainable than can be imagined in First World countries. This was elaborated on for me in Davis’ typology of slums. “The urban poor have to solve a complex question of shelter, journey to work, and sometimes, personal safety.” (pg.27) This question is often answered, he explains, through the upmost practical and waste-reducing ways. Living near work is a huge priority, never acquiring more than can be consumed is a principle that must be lived by, as well as the prevalence of dense (although not technically voluntarily so) residential neighborhoods that conserve space. Block-housing, tenement or project housing, these are all formal settings that encourage highly dense living situations. There are also, Davis explains, informal residential settings that are more often then not very prude to not waste space. In Kolkata, planned communities of huts hold 13.5 people in an average of 45-square meter rooms. Then there are the suburb slums, the peripheral slums. Here we see the “centrifugal forces of the city collide with the implosion of the countryside.” (pg.46) I see this too in America, although most certainly to a lesser and far more comfortable extent. The disconnect between these forces, termed rightfully by Davis, can be seen as this – the explosion (violent move outwards) of the city and the implosion (destruction from within, inwards downfall) of rural life. Whether many Americans will ever understand a new definition of suburb that involves maybe a city made from a “garbage mountain” (pg.49) or a violent hellhole where children entertain themselves with hand grenades, I see that understanding as very far in the future. In this new economic global space, Davis’ piece is all-important. Many Americans pride comfortable living conditions: two acres of land for every family, two bathrooms in one house, one bedroom for each child and ample living space. How we relate this pride to the absolutely humbling, depressing and real look at Thirld World slums must be top priority in understanding the struggle we face in changing the inequalities prevalent today. Bethanie Kloecker