The Science of Human Settlements: Key Debates on Environment, Urbanisation and Development

Abstract

This seminar examines the rise of human settlements as a framework for rethinking architecture’s role in regard to development, urbanisation, and the environment after 1960. Through key texts and policy documents, we will explore how architecture was integrated into global agendas and reconceived as a social science.

Objective

In the decades following World War II, architecture and urban planning were increasingly reconceived as part of a broader field of the social sciences. Under the influence of emerging global challenges—rapid urbanisation, environmental degradation, and shifting development priorities—the idea of human settlements came to offer a new framework for understanding the built environment, one that spanned disciplinary, geographic, and ideological boundaries. Focusing on the period from the 1960s to the late 1970s, this seminar traces the conceptual development of human settlements, including critical responses, the diversification of urban thought, and prospective directions in urban theory and practice. We will analyse a series of foundational texts and policy documents that reflect the changing relationship between architecture, development, and the environment. Among the key moments we will explore are Constantinos Doxiadis’s proposal of Ekistics, a foundational attempt to establish a science of human settlements; the short-lived but ambitious Institut de l’Environnement in Paris (1969–1971), which reflected a growing institutional focus on environmental questions; and the 1976 United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat I) in Vancouver, which marked a critical juncture in the integration of architecture and planning into global development agendas. We will explore how international actors shifted from viewing urban and rural transformation as primarily technical undertakings—focused on infrastructure, layout, and efficiency—to recognizing them as deeply social and ecological processes. The seminar readings—spanning scholarly publications, illustrated histories, UN reports, and experimental design manuals—will provide insight into a period when architecture’s role in shaping the quality of life became central to development thinking. Readings include selected works by: – Jane Jacobs’s The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961) – John Friedmann and John Miller’s The Urban Field (1965) – Ernest Weissmann’s The Urban Crisis in the World (1965) – Sibyl Moholy-Nagy’s Matrix of Man. An Illustrated History of Urban Environment (1968) – Horatio Caminos, John A. Steffian and John F C. Turner’s Urban Dwelling Environments. An Elementary Survey of Settlements for the Study of Design Determinants (1968) – Constantinos A. Doxiadis’s Ekistics (1968) – Henri Lefebvre’s The Urban Revolution (1970) – Jaqueline Tyrwhitt and Gwen Bell’s Human Identity in the Urban Environment (1971) – Hasan Fathy’s Architecture for the Poor (1973) – Margaret Mead and Ken Heyman’s World Enough. Rethinking the Future (1975) – Barbara Ward’s The Home of Man (1976) – Declarations of the Habitat Conference and the Habitat Forum (1976) By investigating these works, the seminar will address key questions: What does it mean to plan for human settlements? How did the concept evolve through critical reflections? How were architecture and planning reframed within development discourse? And how do these mid-20th-century debates inform current approaches to climate, urbanisation, and spatial justice? These questions will also guide the final delivery: a short academic essay that engages critically with the seminar’s themes and readings. As this essay will be a blog entry aimed at a broader audience, a clear and engaging style, as well as the use of images, diagrams or archival material, are important.

Resources