A New Future for Utopian Thought

With the relinquishment of utopias, man would lose his will to shape history, and there with his ability to change it.”
- Mannheim


The city of Sarajevo, scarred by the war, receives a thorough renovation. The city is re-integrated and distant Starigrad is reconnected with the city through the development of Centar.

The former Yugoslav army base is redeveloped to fulfil a societal function. The campus of the university which is already partly located in the old base is now sited here completely. These old Tito-era barracks are positioned in the middle of town and the development will re-connect the separated parts of the city. The airport will leave the city and replaced by the race track ‘Sarajevo Prix’ . An infrastructural master plan will ensure that bike paths are put in place all over town as will an agreeable and fast public transport system.

Cultural bottom-up initiatives emerge all over the city like mushrooms; a network of cultural entrepreneurs meets each other in coffee houses and grand cafés throughout the city. A new cultural elite emerges and cosmopolitanism takes hold in the city. Well-being goes up steadily and the quality of life will soon be equal to that of West European cities.

The reality is much coarser. The chance that Sarajevo in twenty years time will still be scarred by grenade craters – 'roses' in vox popular – poverty, and chaos is significant. Moreover, ethnic segregation is still present and corruption is engrained in society.

Indeed, there are plenty of ideas, and something needs to be done with them. This utopian vision of the city of Sarajevo outlined above emerged from the workshop Utopian City that the Danube Foundation gave in Sarajevo in April 2009. The event was part of a sequence of workshops given in capitals all over Europe and in where, after a presentation about Utopia and the city, local participants discuss their ideal city. They give form to their utopian city through a collage and present their narrative and utopian vision to the group.

Danube believes that utopian ideas should play a valuable role in our plans for the future. This oft-discredited concept is strongly associated with failed socialist or totalitarian utopias but presents us with the possibility of a vision for society. Danube plans to again employ utopian thought as an instrument, a tool generating visions for the future, for new visions for Europe.

In the presentation of the workshop a brief overview is given on the history of Utopian thought. The concept of Utopia refers to the equally named publication of Thomas More. Utopia as a compilation of Greek terms, having a double meaning: the ‘no place’ and the ‘good place’, so a place that does not exist and that is perfect. Both of these connotations are important in order to fully and correctly understand the function of Utopia. More’s utopian society was not a society he considered attainable. It was both a model for the ideal society and a critique on the society in which he lived: England in the early 16th Century. Ever since Plato’s Republic ideal societies are being sketched to fulfil these roles. Dystopia, , like the story of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, is on-first-glance a contrary concept. But dystopias fulfil this same role of critiquing current societies, yet doing so by extrapolating relevant trends or elements of society.

Interaction between physical structure and social organisation has always surfaced in utopian models since More’s Utopia. This is a key reason why architecture has such an intense relationship with utopian thought. Modernism, where the belief in a creatable society has played a large role, was particularly keen on developing the idea of interaction between the physical structure and social organisation. Modernism, which celebrated its glory days in the late 19th and early 20th century, was partly a response to the effects of industrialisation and the social problems that came along with it. A new balance between man and nature had to be found.

A central theme was a rejection of history and tradition and a utopian desire to create a better world, to reinvent the world, accompanied by an enormous faith in the possibilities of technology. These principles joined with social and political ideologies, and gave art and design a large role in solving the problems of society. Modernistic master plans were both in the West as in the East packed with ideology and ideas about the new human. There was a broadly spread utopianism present, a belief in the possibility of a better future.

People actually believed a perfect endpoint was achievable: the Socialist Utopia, the Third Reich, or the Workers’ Paradise – each to their own was an obtainable society. With this belief one of the senses of Utopia, namely that of the ‘non place’, was lost and with that the totalitarian idea that violence was legitimate entered scene. For, if paradise is within reach, then the end will surely justify all means.

Today society is sceptical when it comes to grand visionary plans for a better world. The world has experienced totalitarian communism, the Holocaust and the gulags; utopian thought now mostly scares us. Hence the raise of postmodern thought: Postmodernism promotes a radical relativism and one could say this has led us to an empty pragmatism firmly present in the political culture. Postmodernism places individualism in opposition to universalism, chaos against order, reaction in oppostion to the masterplan, and intrinsic insecurity instead of rational solutions. With this rise of postmodernism grand narratives, visions, and direction disappeared.

These developments have taken vision away from Europe and left Europeans without dreams. Pragmatism might work well for technocrats but it does not lead to true coherence and meaning. Danube questions whether a society can actually function without a notion of utopia. Are dreams and grand visions not the necessary building block of society? Is this not exactly what current society is missing: visions and ideals with which it can fend off individualism and indifference?

Danube wants to overcome the problems of postmodernity and refuses be held back by scepticism and relativism. It is critical to dare to dream again and to again believe in something. Utopian visions, however, have to incorporate both connotations of the original Utopia concept: the ideal place and the no place. Utopian visions give us direction but are in definition unattainable.

Danube therefore stands for a new perspective. Cultural diversity is central to Europe and will not be captured in one grand narrative, in one vision, but it can be in a bundle of stories or visions. It will be an endless bundle of stories, where stories react to each other and have a new ending every time. These are not stories about Europe but stories of Europe. What we imagine is a continuing discussion, a continuous exchange of ideas. This dynamic offers Europe a future by continuously bringing in new subjects and perspectives to keep the discussion and exchange alive.

Danube gathers stories, dreams and ideals of young Europeans from all corners of Europe by means of these workshops. The dreams of the young Europeans in Sarajevo, Belgrade, Amsterdam and Berlin are captured and passed on. Following every workshop a local artist produces a work based on the winning concept. All the small stories together form a grand story and people reflect on the imagined utopian city as a model for the imagined society.

These bottom-up ideas about the imagined city together form imagined Europe. These ideas are fruitful because as this collection of ideas draws out alternatives, at the same time it points out what wrong with the current situation. These ideals ultimately establish a direction for policy. Architects have developed many projects which have never been realised and realisation was never the intention of many of them. They were ideas, partly spielerei, but they do give direction towards an ultimate goal that can never be reached, standing like a light house in the distance as a beacon of hope. Without direction we are helpless.

North/South line

‘It is difficult, if not impossible, to understand wholes by focusing on parts, yet it is possible to understand the parts by seeing the connections of the whole’ (Charles Landry, 2006)

Last couple of years North/South line is an unavoidable phrase in the public discourse of Amsterdam. It dominated the atmosphere during the local elections last March and it became one of the main debates.

The North/South line is nothing more that an ordinary metro line which will connect the quiet, almost rural North Amsterdam with the dynamic business centre in the South, passing beneath the historical and aesthetical highlights of the city centre. A metro that needs to give Amsterdam the allure of a metropolis and prove that Amsterdam can still be mentioned between the names as Berlin, London and Paris. Nevertheless, the fundaments of Amsterdam are quite different to the other cities and the threats for the cultural heritage of the city are much higher. The subsidence of the soil threatens historical building and forces the inhabitants to leave their residences.

Despite all the inconveniences and the rising commotion around this project, there is still the conviction that the metro is the indisputable step in the city development. Not a strange reasoning, nor an easy one to digest for an average citizen of Amsterdam.

The public support is slowly melting down. The question arose if the metro is really that indispensable for the future of Amsterdam. Are the sufferings seriously worth it? There seems to be a misbalance between profits and losses. Nobody seems to know what the right statement should be, nor who is representing it. There is confusion and ignorance, elements which are feeding the feeling of insecurity and scariness. Feelings that inspire a conservative attitude and the tendency to keep things the way they were. Rather no progress than incomprehensible changes. Making a choice in those restless times seems so random. There seems no directions, no signs, no vision. There is just the burden called North/South line.

Nevertheless, the metro is definitely the next step in the development of Amsterdam. But, the crucial thing is to comprehend that this project is just a part of a bigger story Amsterdam needs to tell. The question that should be raised is: what is the roll of North/South line in the bigger vision of Amsterdam?

Unfortunately, the policy makers seem not to be aware of this question, nor of the story they want to tell. The vision seems not clear for the moment. At least not for the ordinary citizen. The increasing resistance is the result of the unclear visions. While the vision should be the story that encloses the dreams, wishes and possibilities of Amsterdam and its citizens. Only by making the vision lucid, the Amsterdamers could become conscious of the value of this challenging project called North/South line.
TB

New Utopian Vista: Wellbeing

The Dutch political party Groenlinks now refers to wellbeing in their election program, making  'Bruto National Happiness' one of the main indicators of a succesful policy. Groenlinks takes this leap following the publication of the 'Stiglitz report' earlier this year.

In january of his year the report by the Stiglitz Commission, commissioned by the French president Sarkozy, came out:  This 'Report on the measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress' also advocates for the need for other measures of economic performance then the good old GDP.

From being an obscure idea, promoted only by a few, the idea of wellbeing and happyness indicators is now gaining popularity and seems to really start having influence on policy. The concept had been floating around in some parts of the European Commission for a while as well, but no clear push on it has come fom that side. Ofcourse, some would say, it has to come from national governments. Well, let's see how far the Netherlands takes this, provided Groenlinks takes part in the government.

Having other measures of performance then GDP seems like a really good idea, and giving happiness some more weight in policy making seems only logical.  As long as we remember that wellbeing indicators and  especially the subjective wellbeing indicators of happiness,  are just a direction for policy. Happiness is nor a clear nor a  fully attainable goal. It would be utopian to think it is.

Utopian City Project

Check out our Utopian City Project; creating visions for Europe...

The Danube Foundation organizes workshops in cities all over Europe to capture the the dreams of young european. These dreams are captured in Utopian Cities created by the workshop participants.

WB

Xenofobia, the new hot thing

A specter is haunting Europe: the specter of Xenofobia. Like many other European countries, the Netherlands have not been able to resist the temptation of creating  'the other' and then seeing it as a threat. The threat to which we can canalize all our fears and frustrations, our real  and imagined socio-economic problems, security problems, identitiy problems and  ideas of marginalisation, our fears. But fears are never imagined, they are real.  We just have to deal with them in the right way. Globalisation, Europeanisation and immigration are intimidating phenomena, how to react and reorganise is not always immediately or entirely clear. But the underbelly feelings are the least constructive and rational reaction and they should not be exploited by our politicians.

I was always really proud of the Netherlands, our free and tolerant country. Where policies where rational, evidence based and progressive. No longer so, I am no longer proud. I am ashamed. Maybe tolerance, which is firmly based in our culture and allowed the protestants and catholics to live side by side, in spite of their radical different beliefs, is not all that. The tolerance that we have now lost as a society it seems. Maybe what we really need is an open mind. But I will take tolerance as a substitute any time, because if we let go of that, ugly things appear.

SB

Danube Manifesto

Do read the Danube Foundation's Manifesto!   Europe 2.0: The Next generation
Here we explain why we think what we do is important. .

http://danube-foundation.eu/main/wp-content/uploads/Manifesto.pdf