Dr Peter Parkes
Design Architect and Cultural Theorist/Critic

Coloqium 25 November 1992 School of Architecture Victoria University of Welington

Link to the full paper here.

There are many signs in contemporary architectural thinking to suggest that social commitment in design is on the way out. Many architects, commentators and teachers in mainstream architecture seem to be turing away from social issues in design; overlooking issues of social content. It seems that in these days, architectural design is no longer
based on a rigorous critique of society, no longer an exercise of critical social practice. Some design thinkers are, apparently, abandoning desire for social reform, giving up hope in architecture as an agency for achieving a ‘better’, more desirable society, as a vehicle
for contributing, if not anticipating change in peoples lives. Design thinkers, in their flagging social commitment, are repressing the emancipatory potential of architecture; their ambivalence towards social issues leaves the harsh prevailing conditions in this society unchallenged. In so doing, design thinkers are, in effect, increasingly permitting such conditions ot flourish, to persist without resistance.

~ Peter Parkes, 1992.