 So Beatrice, Ricky, do we manage, do we design, do we steer, do we control, what do we do about growth in cities? Well, I'm on the, as you're sitting with Alejandro over here, you know, I think that what Alejandro represents and what he discusses is a form of architectural practice that is very much a 21st century paradise where architects are finding themselves in positions where they're dealing with the mechanisms of power of cities. And for me it's not just about architectural practitioners or people coming out of architecture school but it's about architects setting up MVOs, architects forming groups, lobbying governments, starting to think tanks. Architectural education is leading towards, you know, thanks to courses like this at the LSE, you know, all over the world at Harvard, MIT, architects are sort of feeling their, the positions of power that they can reach and how much influence they can have in cities. So for me it's about architectural education and about cultural education moving towards positions of power in cities. I mean, what was striking in these two presentation and very much at the heart of what I think you just said, is that in a way you've got, is the issue of language and, you know, in a way your story, your personal story of moving into the formal world of academia and needing to find a language to talk about architecture that was justified in the bigger context. And here we have the head of, you know, one of the world's most important sort of international institutions using a language that frankly most of the people who listen to you worry about because you're talking about density, you're talking about urban space, you're talking about the quality of design in a world where that's often used as I think one of the important issues and therefore that goes to the heart perhaps of something we can go back to, which is to do with education and how things are formed. But I did in a way want to pick up, given that Ron gave the world lecture on how to solve the problems of cities, rightly so because you can't talk about it in a narrow way, is perhaps just pick up one or two things which it seemed to me totally to connect in terms of your two presentations. Klaus talked about the we've lost the ability to extend the city, right? That's a very, very, you talked about planned extensions of the pictures he showed were of the famous plan of Surda in the 1850s in Barcelona. And I think in many ways if you think of the aqueduct that you showed at the end a moment ago or the public space that you showed in your white spaces, the question is how do you add to it? And I think some of the thoughts that we've had, this is something shared with Senator and many others here, is the issue of also time which comes into it, which I was curious to know what you felt about that because one of the biggest urgencies now is to build these number of units over a very, very short period of time, which has not been the case from the middle ages to the 18th century or from the 18th century to the 19th century. From the 19th century on it's become more urgent. And perhaps we all admire the process of urban change, which is through accretion. That's the term that it happens slowly, things adapt, you test them and everything else. But much of the work that you dislike, but which is what we see, those last terrifying four slides of those four cities that we can't remember, are about urban intervention through rupture because you've got to sort of create something immediate. So I'm just curious whether the two of you from different sides feel that there is a way in which the discipline or in a way even the legal entity can do that because I think for Betrice and me involved in education or at least engaging with the public on these issues, that's one of the biggest question marks. I feel optimistic, but I'm just curious as to where that sort of discussion is going in your mind. No, I think that there's still time and space to do urbanism. Urbanism is still alive and perhaps not in a very good example or in all the faces of its output, but the Chinese urbanization is an example. When you have a policy, a national policy and you have a clear direction, it's possible to do urbanism, but although I say, I repeat that the Chinese model has some errors in the design, then the question is to do urbanism of good quality. The problem that we face in the developing world is that the decision makers, they are not aware about urbanism. They don't understand even what we are talking about because they understand about the free market, investment, the Washington consensus, the central bank, the minister of finance, the control of inflation, and I don't know what else they know, but when you say no, but why don't you just put the straight street here and then the corner instead of looking at why don't you put the corner in that? They don't feel that first, is there duty? In fact, they feel that it's not their duty to do so. They think that urbanization is a kind of spontaneous thing that happens. And this is the stream, this is the most serious question. There's no philosophical complex issue that, you know, like the fourth dimension of time we have lost. No, no, no, it's much easier. Urbanization now is happening at $500 per capita when a society reached $500 in the past, at the beginning of the 20th century, urbanization was happening at around $2,000 per capita. Now urbanization is happening at $500 per capita. And well, because people have more information and people want to go to the city, just in case there's an opportunity there. Then the number of people arriving is much bigger than the capacity of the government to plan. But this doesn't make it impossible to plan. The problem is that the decision makers, they don't know about it. They are not aware. Even they don't feel that it's their responsibility. It's a kind of total color blindness. Joan, let me try to connect. We have three comments about education. And I have certain skepticism about the capacity of technical knowledge itself to produce better urbanization. Actually, John Turner, who studied a few blocks up to the north, decided in the late 50s to go to Peru to de-educate himself, what he called the de-learning of the architect. So I'm thinking that there's a notion of expanding the language, which is something that Alejandro and Ricky have talked about. But I'm curious whether it's one of technical knowledge, political will, or learning differently or de-learning. You know who planned Philadelphia? You know the author of Philadelphia? Mr. Perry himself, in a night, during a night, he drew the lines of downtown Philadelphia. Then what is important for urban planning, even now, is not the very complexity of tools or is not the most important thing is the political side and the political will to introduce planning. Then if the plan is, you know, when the three commissioners in 1811, they designed Manhattan. Manhattan was at $1,500 per capita and the three commissioners probably they never went to Harvard. And Manhattan is the most productive urban piece of the world. Then the problem that we have lost and the education, of course the education should be for the students and professionals, and this is why we earn our salary. But the ones to be educated first and utmost is the decision makers, because they don't have the slightest idea of what they are doing. Alejandro, would you like to... So I'm trying to connect the time and design in a new way that you were trying to ask. Well, I would say that we were educated in a system where controlled about form. It was about form-making, but that form had to be controlled. I still think that it is about form. Ultimately, we still have to do forms, but maybe the new thing is that we have to deal with open system and not with closed systems. So you frame and channel forces instead of controlling the forces. That's one thing. Regarding time, what we have found in our practice and then somehow it's our modest opinion as a conclusion from what we found working in the field, is two dimensions of time, compressing and stressing time and then having a much expanded notion of time. What do I mean by this? You just said Philadelphia plant overnight. When you have crisis, when you have natural disasters or immigration crisis, you have a pressure to come up with something in much shorter times that conventional planning that I guess it lacks the kind of tension that that moment of synthesis is required. So even though it's a cliche, the wind of a opportunity of crisis and disasters shouldn't be missed. Otherwise, we invent artificial ones, Olympic games and World Cups and something to put you a deadline, which I think is a good thing. I was last Friday in Stockholm. They received 10,000 immigrants per week. That's a wind of opportunity that you need to use to compress and stress time. So that's one thing which I think it's very important. Conventional timing, kind of multi-year kind of thing won't make it. So it's a good thing. The counterpart of this, when you have people being responsible of many of the constructions, this open system that people will build anyhow, even if you don't want to, it's the fact that they will build. If you put, sit them on the table on day one, says they are going to be part responsible and split tasks, then if they feel that they have been there in the moment where that vision was synthesized, then they might be the only ones there when authorities change. No relevant change in cities will happen in political timing. The relevant changes take place in periods of time that may be two periods or three periods. So if you had a good participatory process, but not in the cliche of the romantic hippie kind of thing, I mean, if we really split task and responsibilities, they may be the only guarantee of the continuity of that vision. So I guess that this other dimension of longer periods of time combined with stressing time offers a clue for this way of having successful, open, not controlled systems. Alejandro, but only if it has a thing that goes like making wine is easy. It's only the first 200 years that it is difficult. And maybe cities are like that. I'm curious whether the favelas of Rio will become the urbinos in a few years. Beatriz, maybe your experience in the as curator of the Lisbon finale. I'm curious whether this education extends both at the level of decision makers, but also at society as large to include in more participatory processes. Yeah, in Lisbon, two years ago, we made a, you know, me and four other curators work together to try and demonstrate a certain plurality, a certain ways in which architects were acting in the crisis in Portugal. And many of them were connecting. They had no ways of building traditionally. There was no formal outcome. And, you know, when you were saying, oh, you know, what would we do with social housing? Is it a book or an exhibition? I mean, that's essentially the form of practice that was that was really taking place in Lisbon. And, you know, there was, for example, a young practice, Arteria, who were whose whose project was simply to document all of the empty houses in Lisbon, allocate floor plans, take photographs of them, put them online and connect them to possible owners and developers and architects. And so in a way for them, architectural practice was about mobilizing resources and connecting people to systems in a similar way. And, you know, also I lived in China and I did a Biennale, Shenzhen Biennale in China. And this was a city that was so, you know, exponentially, extraordinarily, you know, catapulted into the 21st century. And there we worked with people who were coming from the countryside part of who were there when it was like 1981 in a fishing village. And we were able to, you know, work with them to kind of create a cultural project that was part of the Biennale there, a kind of little, you know, kind of urban interventions that were supposed to be temporary, but were then absorbed by the local people and became permanent installations in the city. And I think that, you know, for me, being a curator, it's not about representing past projects, but actually kind of enabling a certain agency through cultural production. So using, you know, whatever, you know, you guys have both are doing Biennales, and there are ways of doing them that really isn't just about reflection, but it's really about production. And I think that's when, you know, you can really make it sort of provide support for other architects and provide a platform for other ways of making architecture and doing architecture. And I think one of the key things of the process, as you're also describing, is a process of actually engaging with what is there. And the case of Lisbon, interesting, you say that was at a time, you know, very severe crisis and how do you intervene net to breathe life back into it? Or in the cases of, you know, these mega cities that you're describing, how do you civilize them? And at the heart of that approach, I think, implicit in what is being said is, is the notion of sort of retrofitting, which was you take what is there, and you try to improve it in a way with with sort of minimal means. And yes, you're right that Mr. Penn designed the city overnight. That's not that interesting. What's interesting about it is that over the next 200 years that adapted your point about the 1811 plan is that actually, New York has been able to completely transform itself. Areas that were fashion districts have become art houses have become condos, whatever it is. But the street structures remain the same. The model for us, which is relevant is the, let's say the Georgian House in London or places like Notting Hill, which you know, we're designed for one thing, middle class housing at the turn of whatever, early 19th century, then became nearly squatter settlements, student housing, drug dealing territory. And now you can't even park your BMW over your Audi because it's become so intense. What has remained the same as the urban infrastructure. And I think these are ways of actually retrofitting and reworking with what is there. But also understanding this issue of time, Alejandro, which I think is what what matters. So just designing it overnight, so what? I mean, that's not gonna work. No, the problem is that in most of the developing world, the level of a spontaneous organization of people arriving to the city is so high that they do the metastatic growth, like the cancer, they put themselves whatever they can. And then if you want to resettle or replan these settlements, it becomes extremely expensive. And it becomes in a in a democratic society, it becomes a huge conflict. Then this is why the relevance of making political decisions in advance or as soon as possible. It's so crucial. Because as more the decision is delayed, the problem becomes worse. This is the dramatic situation of organization that the the politicians, the decision makers, they are absent because they don't feel as it's their duty to plan. And in fact, a spontaneous organization is happening at a mass scale. This is the time problem that that we need to change that as soon as possible. For example, Planet City's tensions in these places are becoming very difficult, because there's even no land around free that you can use as a Planet City extension. Then if we don't rise, while we are talking here, 20,000 people more happy squadron, surroundings of mega cities, just in one hour, there's not a there's not a small paradox that the the politician is defending design, and the architect is defending management in a way. And let me make a quick comment on what you just said, if some favelas will become Urbino or not, well, if they got the nolly right, maybe, but if the you got I mean, what you're just saying, if that initial geometrical greed, black and white, public and private is not right, they will never do so. But eventually, if that if that is right at the very beginning, they may in the in the 70s, late 60s and 70s, during a yende in Chile, there was a very interesting way to try to cope with the amount of people migrating towards cities. And the translation would be operation chock. That meant that the only thing that you had were chalk to draw the grid. So you define the roads, the private lots, and not even the swatch on the water, but then if that was right, then you can't keep on upgrading over time. So that incrementality, it may lead the initial slum into Urbino or or or Manhattan. If that initial form is there, there's a very nice natural experiment in organization, which is fantastic. Is the upper height organization in South Africa? The the free towns, what is the name of the places townships? Townships. They were designed with streets because the police wanted to have easy access. And and and and and then they designed these these these townships. And but one day upper height disappear. It was no more upper height. And now if you go to South Africa, you compare the the these townships with the small surroundings or slums nearby Joburko. Which do you think it's better? The township, the townships even planning done for bad purpose. If it's good, it's going to serve the purpose at the long. But wouldn't you say that also the right knowledge that you showed up from Paris? It's also retrofitted knowledge by the way. She's house man. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I find interesting that in the kind of those moments of magnificent and Sanchez and grow the commissioners plan house man answer that those happen at a moment where we had the most pessimism about cities. And nowadays, in probably the new golden age of urbanisms or cities, we don't have planners. Yeah. But you know, if in 1811, the three commissioners in Manhattan, they were able to design the streets that we walk there now. Why at the 21th century, we cannot do the same again. You just spent an hour telling us why. But it's dramatic, isn't it? It's dramatic, isn't it? No, which then goes back to the education of I guess a possible answer is because we don't trust simplicity. The more complex the problem, the more the need for the simple answer. And then I guess all the consultants and experts want to sell complexity. Yeah. So in the end, and how in cities in form of a plane, like in Brazil, like if this, like if Brazilian was going to take off. Why is the bloody reason why a city should have a form of a plane? And in order to make things more complex, let's open the floor for discussion. The way we're going to do it is maybe four or five questions and we'll let the banel answer. So please be brief. Don't stretch with long commentaries. We have 10 minutes. One, two, three, and four, four. The one economist. Okay, finally. Okay. Yeah, well, I thought about the role of the quality of the city, which is also a big problem. And I would like to know what you think about how to design for people, how do you sign for social justice and not only for growth in this time of the day? Yes, we spoke about the cities looking the same these days and all the bad parts of all the cities that we know and love. But if you want to inspire a generation of policymakers or architects or designers or anything, where would you tell us to look? Where do you tell us? Where do we tell us to look? Ah, okay. Here. Hi, my question is for Alejandro. My name is Fernanda. I'm from Brazil. And I'm very interested in how can we engage people living in slums that is already built? So how can we engage them to rebuild in one plan like the Lamento that they they have to build the other 50% wait, wait, for the record, specialism, Indian child. Well, I'm slightly troubled by the assumption that is all problems concerning urbanism can be solved through better design. I think I want to bring the question of livelihood. The world is full of buildings and structures, but without proper economic means of sustenance. In fact, they actually have never been realized. So in some sense, the assumption is that we are neglecting the major problem which faces the third world cities. The second is when we talk about planning, we assume that there is a functioning government. In lot of cities of the third world, there are many urban areas, complete lack of government. Maybe one more than we answer. One more. One more. Here. Thank you for your sharing. I come from Hong Kong and in Hong Kong is really like architects like you mentioned only or like a lot of the urban planning in Hong Kong is driven by money and the government and the developers work together to develop the city in a way. And how how can we convince the government that we need to work with the people and co-design and to lead to better well-being and livelihood of the people and the city for the well-being of everyone? Because not all the architects in Hong Kong are like you guys. You want? Me? Yeah. But short. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I don't think so. I'll try. I have spoken too much. Well, all the questions are good. I'll try to combine a bit. Inequality and engaging of people. Start with inequality. A big, big underlining of that major issue in the sense that, for example, take Chile. Chile at the moment is a country of $22,000 per capita a year. If you take out, we're 17 million people, so let's say four million families, if you take out 1,000 families, income drops to $10,000 per capita per year. So that's the embarrassing level of inequalities in a country like Chile. So if there's any agreement in the political spectrum of the country, is that we do have a problem with inequalities. What's the only thing that is being heard to correct inequalities? Pre-distribution of income. As if inequalities was an economical problem only. It is economical, it's social, it's racial, it's cultural. And in that sense, the assumption is to correct inequalities, better education, because if you're better educated, you can have access to a better salary. And by having a better salary, you may buy yourself a better house or a better car instead of going in public transportation that is really inefficient and so on and so forth. But if anything, I would say that cities are a shortcut towards equality. If you identify strategically projects in the city, take public transportation without changing income, without changing where you live two hours away in the periphery, without changing anything, the quality of life that you can improve by making an efficient public transportation system, it's huge. Let's assume that people is seated on a bus. How much that costs? Compared to the other thing, it's a much more efficient way. Public space, again, if you can improve quality of life in Chile, if you want to take a decent walk, continuous walk, you can only do that if you're a member of a golf club. If you have a public space that capitalizes geography in a magnificent way, like Rio de Janeiro does with the sidewalks, for example, it's a huge way to correct inequalities. So from that point of view, I would say that cities are an extremely powerful and efficient vehicle to correct inequalities, becoming a kind of shortcut. The thing is that we may eventually need to ask people about what is the problem that is pressing them. We had the experience in the reconstruction of the city after the earthquake, and the question was how to protect the city after a tsunami. And we were about, as a country, to answer well the wrong question. When people was asked, they said, okay, a tsunami may be an issue, but the next one is going to be in 20, 25 years, but every single year we have a problem with the flooding of the rain. We do not have public space that is decent, so they may earn some money there around the forest industry, but the quality of life is extremely poor. The identity of the city was connected to the geography of the river, but it was privately owned. Nobody could have access to the river. So I guess if you ask and if you intend the process of participation, not as a way to get answers from the people, but as a way to identify with precision what is the question, then eventually that may give a clue so that afterwards those forces are channeled in the proper way. Let me take the question of the second interview. You have asked about how to train the people to design better and about the four photos that I presented. One characteristic of common to the four photos is that there's architecture, more or less, but there's no urbanism plan. Have you looked at that? If you look at the four photos, they are in an open space. There's a building which is done with no restriction provided by the public space. The designer was able to use the public space as they like. It's a little bit of this tendency of the international model of architecture that they take the project and instead of being forced to build like Gaudí was forced to build in a plot in a street or the chaps in New York they are forced to build the high rises in a plot on the street grid. They can use the land of the street as they as ever they occur to them and of course if they don't understand the logic of the public space they can produce monsters. Then I think that it's very important first in order to improve architecture is to have to put architecture in a balanced way with urbanism. There's no such a thing as just a project alone. It needs to be balanced with the urbanism, the public space. The other question is how we train for good taste because then it's a question of bad taste. How you train the people to, you know, you need to study, you need to go to the museums, you need to try to, you know, to cultivate yourself, to appreciate beauty, you know, it's not something that comes just, you know, it requires some mental effort. It's not just doing whatever. You know, Frank Gehrys or Saka Sahid says there are no men in the world. Then for the normal of us we need to follow some rules and to train ourselves and try to do things with good taste, you know. I think we, it's 8.05 and I promise to get you all out of here by 8 o'clock. So I just want to thank our panelists and the presenters Alejandro Beatriz, Ricky Joan, fantastic conversation. Everyone, Ute, thank you and the Herhousel Society of the Deutsche Bank, LSECities and Urban Age for bringing us here. On Wednesday we have Sasuke Sascha and Anthony Williams who will be here discussing questions of who owns the city. So the questions of equity we promise to touch upon on Wednesday. Thank you very much for coming.