Professional Documents
Culture Documents
condition that we could not imagine, such as living with pigs and even their dead
children. All kinds of problems and solutions help shape the city today and see the
progress of modernity.
public health etc. to make everyone chance of living more balance. Another element is
multipli/city as a primary good, in definition multipli/city mean an autonomous civil
life relatively free from direct supervision and control by the state. (Friedmann, 2000,
P.467) Michael Walzer calls a civic society a project of projects, which means people are
interrelated to each other and are responsible to one another (Walzer,1992, P.107). The
idea of diversity, mutual tolerance of difference must be protected by the state as
population growth mainly comes from migration. In turn, there implies citizen obligation
and respect of human rights. Furthermore, there are fours factors to support the material
base for the good city: 1) socially adequate housing, 2) affordable healthcare, 3)
Adequately paid job, 4) Adequately social provision, this is the mean of vibrant civil life.
A good city is a city that cares for its freedom (Friedmann, 2002, P.469) The last
element is good governance, Friedmann emphasis on political process is equally
important as outcome, and should involve with a variety of participants in the process.
The governing system should include 3 actors: politicians and bureaucrats, state and civil
society. In utopian thinking is to put citizens at the top of the governance pyramid, to
form a political community. Friedmann also introduces six criteria for assessing the
performance of a system of city-regional governance: 1) inspired political leadership
2)Public accountability 3)transparency and the right to information 4) inclusiveness
5)responsiveness 6)non-violent conflict management (Friedmann, 2002, P.470)
Edward Relph The Modern Urban Landscape
Landscape has largely changes in character and scale, give some insightful ideas on how
the traditional landscape different from the modern landscape. Relph stated that building
is not an isolated object, it is rather with a context, related with the surrounding area, it is
also the products of technological developments and social circumstances (Relph,
1987, p.3). Relph does not include every aspect of landscape but focus on the built
environment of cities. In modern landscape, standardization is promoted so that it fits to
build in anywhere, however differences do exists, some factors including different design
standard, the supply and the cost of building materials do play a role. In addition, Relph
introduce four elements to explain the distinctiveness in historical landscape and
similarity in modern cities, they are architecture which has different aesthetic principles;
technological innovations affect the way we build; planning to protect utopian vision of
good health, justice and equality; and social developments influence the consumer and
corporate landscape. It is also important to note that new technologies invented in
building as well as new form of communication reduce the chance for regional adaption,
which traditionally ideas are constrained by travel time that there was a variety of
landscape base in local customs and architecture. Ideas can flow freely, which sharing,
copying, and borrowing of ideas are very common, all these will lead to similarity in
modern landscape.
References