Shiuan-Wen Chu's Architecture and Design: 2003

Published in Archis #5 2003

South Africa. The first free elections in 1994 turned the whites’ political, social and economic position upside-down. This challenge to white status was accompanied by insecurity about the future. In Johannesburg, the increasing crime rate across the city prompted an exodus of major first-world investors. Africans, previously confined to living outside the city proper in townships or ‘homelands’ started to move into the rest of the city. In response to this black ‘invasion’ the whites fled north in a spatial exodus that only the developers could keep up with. Most businesses migrated from downtown to the northern suburbs so as to be far away from ‘deteriorating’ downtown and ‘dangerous’ Soweto. Within seven years, a whole new suburban city – Standton – had been built in the north by speculators with new office blocks, a new financial centre, new malls, and new houses. Most of the developers’ plans consisted of walled and themed environments.

In Johannesburg, crime is the common topic of conversation among all races and classes. Stories, hearsay, anecdotes, mass media reports, even jokes amplify the threat of crime. Especially amongst the middle class, insecurity about the future, phobia about being the object of hostility and fear of losing possessions has grown into absolute intolerance of the ‘others’ and dramatic magnification of the need for self-defence. Paranoia about the unknown ‘others’, long suppressed under the protection of Apartheid, broke out with a vengeance once that protection was removed. Architecturally, the excessive self-defensiveness, the urge to counterattack, the desire to re-assume power and the longing for temporary mental escape from the unpleasant context, resulted in one logical solution: the fortified enclave.

The violent situation was skilfully exploited by the speculative development sector; high security ‘cluster homes’ and ‘office parks’ were launched, replete with extreme measures for combating crime. The enclave’s strategy for physical security can be summed up in one word, ‘fortification’. This fortification manifests itself in automatic gates operated by remote control, gatehouses manned by security guards, electrified fencing, surveillance cameras, rapid armed response by private security armies, lighting throughout the property, panic buttons, burglar-proof bars, built-in sirens, watch dogs, and spikes, broken glass, razor wire on top of walls, et cetera. Most of the enclaves have a single entry point; every time someone wants to enter, their personal details and the reason for their visit are recorded by security guards.

The characteristics of the enclaves – mono-functional, enclosed by walls and introverted – allow them to be built anywhere regardless of context. These walled and armed environments, filled with an array of programmes, both public and private, are located randomly in Johannesburg’s dry and boring landscape, like oases in the desert. Traditional public spaces, such as parks and squares, are less and less used since they are more likely to be exposed to crime. Emerging semi-public spaces like casinos, shopping malls, entertainment centres, gyms, golf clubs, have fully embraced the enclave principle by controlling access and so securing the commercial and communal environment.

While fortification provides physical protection, the demand for psychological security is satisfied by the architectural styles of the enclaves. Behind walls, all building typologies are European and historically styled; Victorian, Tudor, Mediterranean, Medieval and Georgian themed backdrops allude to safety and moral rectitude, allowing an unpleasant context to be psychologically denied. The theme park is the unconscious architectural strategy; super-reality and idyllic settings serve to replace the real world with an imaginary one. This escapism steers the mental image of reality to an interface between ‘somewhere else’ and ‘here and now’. Given the barren landscape and violent context, architecture in Johannesburg is obliged to provide an enhanced lifestyle in order to keep its inhabitants from emigrating. Every house has a lush garden, barbecue, swimming pool, or even tennis court. Dainfern, the biggest estate enclave in Sandton even has a golf course and clubhouse at the centre of the estate.

Johannesburg’s ‘bad’ taste is, however, fairly tame compared with that of Los Angeles. It is marked not by exuberance but by a mediocrity inspired by embarrassment and fear. Parading one’s wealth can have undesirable and predictable consequences such as kidnapping and robbery. This embarrassment and fear leads to the repressed desire for hedonism and that in turn results in mediocre vulgarity. Architecture best reflects this embarrassment: one lives in a Mediterranean villa, goes shopping in an Italian mall, works in a Tudor Mansion, relaxes in Caesar’s Palace, but all styles and gestures are hidden behind fortifications.

Paranoia is a significant determinant of new developments in Johannesburg. The enclaves are the spaces where middle-class Johannesburgers live, work and play nowadays. Fortification of the enclaves in the interests of physical safety is turning Johannesburg into a landscape of surveillance; the historic and European styles of enclave architecture – a form of psychological escape – are rapidly transforming the city into a giant theme park. Unless one is aware of that fear and paranoia, large parts of present-day Johannesburg do not make sense. But how will this evolve in the future?

Five scenarios for the future of paranoid Johannesburg
The following 5 scenarios are reflections of the nightmare images of what is currently happening or desired. The extreme prejudices and paranoia vis à vis ‘the others’ is manifested in the way the city is organized. In these scenarios, the Have-nots are represented by their movements and aspirations. The Haves are represented by their tools and tactics for modifying and defending their spaces. These 5 scenarios should serve as negative models and as metaphors that also apply outside the context of Johannesburg.

Scenario 1: Berlin Wall Model
Haves immediately erect a huge wall between themselves and the Have-nots.

Consequence
Absolutely no interaction between the two.
Resurrection of Apartheid, only cruder this time.

Scenario 2: Chinese Wall Model
Rows of walls are erected in the north. Located at openings in the walls, along the Highway of Emulation, are check points to control the entry of former Have-nots. But the Hotbed for Emulators is the only route by which Have-nots can acquire a different status.

Consequence
If entering the enclaves is the only aspiration for Have-nots, the Hotbed is crucial to their prospects of empowerment. Competition in the Hotbed will be fierce and the examination strict, but because of this whoever passes through the check points will be treated as an equal in the north. This system suggests that if one wants to become a member of Haves, there is no short cut. There is at least a sense of fairness. The landscape is divided into hierarchical layers with very strict caste system.

Scenario 3: Run-Away Model
As in the other models, those Have-nots who gain entry to the enclaves via the Hotbed and the Highway of Emulation, will become respected members of Haves society. Those who do not emulate and simply move to the north, lingering in the vicinity of the enclaves, make the Haves very nervous. The Haves build more enclaves further north and abandon those to the south in order to stay as far as possible from the ‘invasion’ and ‘threat’ of the Have-nots.

Consequence
Infinite sprawl. Ex-peripheries become new centres and ex-centres become peripheries. Little attempt at integration. Paranoia and escapist mentality of the Haves can radically transform life in the north.

Scenario 4: Medieval Model
With a limited number of former Have-nots successfully entering the enclaves and a majority of Have-nots moving freely and without access control to the north, Haves secure themselves behind thicker and higher walls. Several enclaves are merged into larger units and security measures are stepped up.

Consequence
The walls around individual properties or smaller enclaves start to disappear. The asphalt inside the enclaves can be replaced by parks, gardens or leisure facilities. The increased security measures around these large enclaves will lead to the establishment of small city-states, controlled and protected by private armies. And this will be the new type of wall.

Scenario 5: Secret Box Model
Technology is used to increase complexity and make it more difficult for would-be intruders. Shutters, controlled by Haves and their private armies, close off parts of the city at random times and places in order to make the pattern of the city irregular. It will be impossible for anyone to enter the enclaves if they do not know when and where to enter.

Consequence
The city is a seemingly open system with extremely brutal yet subtle, intricate and sophisticated mechanisms of exclusion. The north will become a giant labyrinth leading to the establishment of secret societies, with access codes only made available to private members with a similar mentality and interests; club membership is subject to the strictest scrutiny – the ultimate system of exclusion. The infrastructure will be privatized and lose its status as a universal right of the free citizen.

Inverting the horror of the wall
The lack of education and opportunities for Have-nots during Apartheid led to unemployment in the post-Apartheid era. Many Have-nots, without employment or the possibility of social betterment, resorted to crime to survive. This in turn gave rise to sophisticated [criminal?] organizations. The result was that the walls became ever thicker and more numerous. The sophistication of the defences against crime increased greatly; the fear and paranoia of the Haves intensified phenomenally; and the tension and stress deeply affected every member of the society. As a result of political, economic or social pressure or personal willingness, the Haves and Have-nots initiated experiments to ease the negative tension and to work together on a possible future.

In the future scenarios, previous forms of division between Haves and Have-nots are challenged by new sets of rules and conflicts. New types of walls are introduced to weaken or destabilize existing ones. These new walls invite and sometimes force Haves and Have-nots to discuss principles and to deal with the new and strange experience of being together. This dialogue could be visual, physical, spatial or economic.
Some of the existing measures of exclusion and inclusion, such as private security armies and check points, are used in a positive and productive manner to protect and serve members of both camps. These future scenarios try to invert the horror of the wall, rather than dissolving the division altogether.

Story 1: Chinese Wall Model
Comrades of the Have-nots outside the city convinced foreign political and financial institutions to impose sanctions on the Haves. This had such a detrimental effect on the Haves’ business undertakings that they were forced to negotiate with the Have-nots in order to survive.
The Have-nots, now in political power, initiate a new division of the city by building four giant walls running in a north-south direction. This new system links negative space outside the enclaves, such as green space and buffer zones, with positive space inside the ghetto. The new division creates a new conflict and makes the existing division obsolete. The five new districts of the city will start to investigate and resolve their inherited conflicts and possibly arrive at different resolutions. This process will be thoroughly documented and closely observed, and serve as a pilot project for future development models in other cities around the world.

On top of these walls is free space for the leisure and pleasure of the citizen. Walking from north to south, one sees the cityscapes of the enclaves, derelict green space, the buffer zone and the ghetto: one is witness to the landscape of apartheid as the most direct and physical manifestation of segregation and exclusion.
Climbing the walls requires a conscious decision to leave existing positions; the new perspective offers an overview of all contrasting conditions. The number of Haves entering the free space is recorded and registered as a gesture of respect towards the Have-nots and as a willingness to coexist. The more willingness the Haves exhibit, the more sanctions will be eased and the more foreign investment will be allowed. Haves try to be popular in order to secure their position in the future political and economic climate.

Story 2: Double Belgian Coast Model
The tension between Haves and Have-nots is getting so intense that it affects both negatively. The instability scares foreign investors away from the city and prompts an exodus of established institutions; both sides suffer the consequences. The economic leaders of the Haves and the political leaders of the Have-nots hold conferences and arrive at a mutual agreement to release the pressure and stabilize the existing situation while maintaining the dynamics of this tension.

This aim is achieved by a model comprising two identical buildings, similar to those unbroken rows of apartment buildings along the Belgian Coast, separated by a buffer zone.

The walled character of the buildings keeps out undesirable intruders, reassures society and hinders any over-hasty integration or reconciliation. The buffer zone is now a free space accessible to both parties and protected against developments outside. The programmes in the buildings are mirrored across the middle line of the buffer zone, so that members can observe the rituals and practices of ‘the others’. The buildings are visual laboratories aimed at familiarizing each group with the lifestyle of ‘the other’; binoculars are provided. Volunteers to live in the buildings are welcomed, living costs are subsidized by sympathetic humanitarian organizations and special taxation rates will apply. Several gaps are carved out of the buildings linking points on both sides and making the invisible connections visible.

The buffer zone is preserved as a reminder of the brutality of Apartheid and its walls. The free space is a space for respect, contemplation, leisure and freedom; members can come to this space to meet, to learn tolerance of the others, to tease or politely harass one other. It is a ‘conceptual dialogue’ space, devoid of architecture, but highly charged with dynamic possibilities. The colour grey symbolizes the co-existence of multiple colours. The sublime ‘wallness’ of the buildings can be fully appreciated here.
This model is a compression of all meanings of the wall: division, isolation, but also protection, connection and facade; altogether it inverts the brutality of the wall into a calming, relieving, sympathetic and connective architecture.

Story 3: Inverse Model
The walls of the post-Apartheid era perpetually thickened and merged into bigger ones (as in the Medieval Scenario); security measures multiplied to deter the proliferation of crime. Out of despair and mistrust of others, individuals started to migrate into ‘tribal’ enclaves: there were enclaves for the English, Afrikaaners, Jews, southern Europeans, Chinese, Indians, Zulus, Xhosas, et cetera. These large enclaves of tribal concentrations were like the artificial island of Deshima near Nagasaki (the only place in Japan to which foreign traders were admitted).

For a long period of time, the area outside these large enclaves was overgrown by nature. Wild animals wandered around freely. The large enclaves themselves, charged with nostalgia, exaggerated their own identity, their fear of the present and uncertainty about the future, which led to an escalation of historicizing architecture. The theme park, with its allusion to safety and moral rectitude, was the unconscious architectural strategy whereby an unpleasant context could be psychologically denied.

Overfamiliar with the boredom of life in the enclaves and the unnecessary thickness of the walls, many youngsters began to abandon their parents’ ideologies and prejudices and left the enclaves. They broke radically with the excessive nostalgia. The descendants of the former Haves and Have-nots pour all their talent and energy into the recovery of their society. Architecture is once again the instrument for creating this beautiful future. A new landscape arises.

In their future city, the large enclaves are preserved as a reminder of post-Apartheid segregation. They are renamed the ‘Cemeteries of Prejudice and Paranoia’. Outside the cemeteries is the new city.