Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
I borrowed that headline. To the person from whom I borrowed it: I would give you credit, but I know you cherish your privacy.
In any event, in my dream world, this is what all journalism from Turkey would be like, and indeed what all foreign correspondence would be like. I don't always agree with Alexander Christie-Miller, and don't necessarily even agree with everything he's written here, but he's writing about a real Turkey, not a caricature; he's careful to say what he does and doesn't know; there are no cliches here, and he's asking a hugely important question about the social effects of mass housing projects:
... We gave them some money, but seeing I was foreign they tried to get more. It was the first time in two years in Istanbul that I had been in that kind of situation. As I automatically looked around to see if anybody else was coming, it struck me how unhealthy was the anonymity and emptiness of this place. One of the most comforting things in Istanbul is the incessant street life, the people standing at their shops, sitting in the teahouses, talking, everyone knowing everyone else.
The boys said they were from Erzincan and had come here looking for work, had been unable to find any, and were now homeless. One said he had a child back home and they were looking to get the money to return. I wasn’t sure if they really were from Erzincan.
It might be a stretch to say that a random encounter such as this is emblematic of anything much. But generally speaking, what is so depressing about the situation is that the mistakes being made by Turkey are both predictable and avoidable. Mass housing policies in which people are stuck in tower blocks far from any economic centres or opportunities have been proven to fail in European and American cities from the 1950s onwards. The evidence is in the Paris 2005 riots, or the ones in London last summer.
The future of the city as envisioned by one interviewee, Yves Cabannes, a former UN advisor on forced evictions, is of a glitzy, gentrified core ringed by ghettoes. Not many people seem to appreciate what a rare and precious thing it is that - to some degree at least - Istanbul is an exception to this familiar pattern.
I suspect, though I haven't asked him, that Alex would describe himself as someone centrist, or even left-of-center, but that's not essential. My argument about this could be described as a conservative one, viz., "Be careful in your enthusiasm to create a better world not to mess up something that works."
A great many things don't work in Turkey because a new system has been hastily erected on top of a traditional social structure, with the effects more cosmetic than real. So you have a legal system, for example, comprised of terrific-sounding laws that don't correspond to observable reality. That doesn't mean there's no law; it means the real laws and the laws on the books exist in separate universes. It should be obvious to many people, although sadly it isn't, that if you kick aside one of the pillars of the real law--very old social norms and values, such as taboos against theft, that are enforced by the community--without having something just as solid to replace it, which Turkey doesn't, really--you'll have massive problems.
That said, it's not enough just to criticize the idea. Building massive, anonymous housing projects is obviously a bad idea. But the traditional solution--turning a blind eye toward to construction of ad-hoc settlements that probably do offer the inhabitants more of a sense of community, but which will collapse and kill them all in even the most mild of earthquakes--is just as obviously a bad idea.
No way, no how will you get people out of those deathtraps without offering them something they want more. You can't just tear them down and say, "You're homeless."
So what's the good idea?
- Comment (18)
- · Quote
- · UnfollowFollow (0)
Comments :
Dec '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
The good idea is the same idea that produces results everywhere. A FREE MARKET in housing. In Florida the housing market is immensely regulated. We are reaching an apogee in this.
Comic Examples (or tragic if you aren't tough enough).
1.) The FAR/BAR lease is now 20 pages long. The first 9 pages (very long for a residential/condo lease) are the actual lease. The last 11 pages is the entire Florida Landlord/Tenant Law! When faxed or emailed to a client this has caused fainting spells. Only Office Depot seems to be happy about this.
2.) A Black couple walks into a Real Estate office in Florida and asks to be shown three properties. They stipulate (without any prompting) that they wish to see only properties in neighborhoods that are at least 50% black. If the Realtor shows them the three properties in the 50% black neighborhoods, the Realtor is guilty of a crime called steering. Obviously, Black Folk just can't be trusted to make their own decisions. That's how we'll get rid of prejudice???
FREEDOM IS WHAT IS ALWAYS IMPORTANT. EVERYTHING ELSE IS JUST STUPID.
Edited on Jan 31 at 12:02amSep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
If working people are to be able to afford to house themselves without any subsidy from the state, then either wages have to go up or rents have to come down. But land, and the housing built on it, is not a commodity like any other, nor is it a factor of production. Its supply is limited, and it is a vehicle for speculation, so a free market is unlikely to balance supply and demand in that sector of the market (homes for rent to working families).
Tower blocks are not inherently bad, but they aren't the best option for familes with children. A great deal has been learned about how to design high-rise estates to make them safe and encourage social interaction. But in terms of housing density, tower blocks aren't as efficient as you might think, because of the unused space around them. Low rise can achieve the same density.
There is an alternative to the inhumanity of Le Corbusier. Turkish planners have to want to learn from the experience of others.
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
Bring Jane Jacobs back to life as a Turk.
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
I'd love just to see a good translation into Turkish--I wonder if one exists?
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
You've just defined your next project!
Great article in the latest City Journal.
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
The problem is different in densely populated urban areas than in suburban or rural areas.
In my megalopolis, there are suburban areas with an abundance of 'affordable housing' in the form of older apartments and small row houses built 50+ years ago. Habitat for Humanity is also popular around here, it seems like new houses go up every week. The city often condemns abandoned properties, but instead of auctioning them off, renovates them and rents/sells them in a 'rent to own' low/no interest arrangement . The State also has an old law that allows squatters to assume ownership of abandoned homes if the listed owner doesn't respond within 3 years.
These are solutions more appropriate to the suburbs than an urban area.
Then, of course, there's section 8 housing, which is a subsidy/rent support federal program that allows people to live wherever they want. This is probably preferable to 'housing projects', but it's a political football that can only grow, and when it grows large enough can distort markets.
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
This seems to me to be completely wrong.
Land is a factor of production.
Like everything in the universe, its supply is limited. And like anything that is traded, it can be used in speculation. So from this point of view land is no different from anything else.
A free market is exactly what tends to balance supply and demand.
If you are saying that the free market fails to provide all working families with stand-alone houses within 20 minutes commute of W1, this is just as true as saying that 'the market' (the collective name given to the free choices of individuals under conditions of liberty) fails to supply Hermes scarves at £10 each. Which is to say, not much.
Nov '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
I'm certainly no expert on either Turkey or urban development, so take this with more than a grain of salt. But isn't the underlying issue the rapid rural-to-urban migration going on in Turkey? France mishandled this in the 19thC through Haussmannization under Napolean III, the end result of which is the impoverished suburban ghettos of Paris; it's a painful lesson that is constantly ignored, even in supposedly modern cities like here in Halifax. I would suggest that if the Turkey wants to keep Istanbul alive and vibrant it might want to put more focus on expanding development - particularly infrastructure, employment, and education - in rural communities.
Aug '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
I'd believe anyone who said he'd left Erzincan for any reason. I myself like the Turkish countryside but I don't have to live there.
My own standard for Asia jounalism, and I take Turkish journalism to be a subset of that, is still Peter Fleming's News From Tartary (1936). I wonder if anyone reads it anymore.
Discussions of urban planning are always eerie. We just need another plan is what even those most hostile to urban planning seem to be saying.
Dec '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
Gaby Charing: If working people are to be able to afford to house themselves without any subsidy from the state, then either wages have to go up or rents have to come down. But land, and the housing built on it, is not a commodity like any other, nor is it a factor of production. Its supply is limited, and it is a vehicle for speculation, so a free market is unlikely to balance supply and demand in that sector of the market (homes for rent to working families).
. · 5 hours ago
Abby, it is exactly this attitude that created the bubble. You like many others are underestimating the FREE Market. You like many others are repeating the half truths of socialism.
When the farms were collectivized in the Soviet Union under Stalin, they instituted what they thought was rational policy. They made all the peasants give up their small gardens as this would have created a small free market.
Then the main crop failed, as had happened many times under the rule of the aristocracy. The small gardens of the peasants would keep people alive when the crop failed. NOW PEOPLE STARVED TO DEATH.
Apr '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
Something has to be said for proper city planing. I have been to Rome and Bucharest which are classic organic cities of Europe. Sure they have some large plazas and public spaces that were planed but for the most part you have no idea where you are and where the street you are on is going. Chicago on the other hand you could navigate with your eyes closed, a regular pace and a stop watch. So really planing your cities is a good thing.
Public housing fails because it is always done on the cheap with no sense of what the community needs or how a community functions. They are pilled together creating zones of abject poverty (I have seen this in Chicago) and moving the wealthy into very defined zones. Public housing should be done with an effort to create neighborhoods with mixed incomes. It may actually be better to just mandate expensive developments to provide some cheap units in each building. Rather than build "projects".
The other thing I would say is if you do plan to build public housing for goodness sake make it look good. It will make everyone feel better about it.
Sep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
genferei
Land is a factor of production.
Like everything in the universe, its supply is limited. And like anything that is traded, it can be used in speculation. So from this point of view land is no different from anything else.
Please look in any first year economics textbook under rent theory to see why land is not a factor of production.
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
How about this from page 88 of Introduction to Microeconomics E201, Dr David A. Dilts (sixth rev. July 7, 2004) (pdf):
Or from page 389 of Principles of Economics, N. Gregory Mankiw:
Or from page 201 of Price Theory, Milton Friedman:
Or from page 397 of Economics: Principles and Policy, William J. Baumol and Allan S. Blinder:
(Presumably this last from a much later edition than the one I used in the first year of my economics degree.)
Sep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
Read Ricardo's theory of rent. Other factors of production have elasticity of supply; land doesn't, except within a small margin. The supply of land can't expand in the way the supply of other factors can. So when demand increases, the price rises and there is insufficient new supply to bring prices down again. This characteristic makes it ideal for speculation, and explains why people on ordinary wages can't afford the market rent. Yes, they can move home, but they have to be able to get to their place of work. It is very important to increase the supply of housing, and this can be done, but there isn't a lot of land that can be brought into use, so the more housing is built on a piece of land, the more rent is taken by the landowner. This really is very basic.
Sep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
A simple example. A piece of land has a street of small houses on it, each rented out for $100 a week. One house is pulled down and replaced by a block of 10 apartments, each with the same number of rooms as the house. Do the apartments fetch $10 a week each? No. The value of the land shoots up as soon as the developer starts work and they all fetch $100 a week. The landowner pockets the profit in the form of a vastly increased land value. Intensive development of land increases the supply of housing but doesn't reduce rents. That is the problem. It's why working people can't afford private rented accommodation. It's even clearer if you think about factories rather than housing. The owner of the factory isn't the one who benefits from more intensive use of the land but the owner of the land. It's why a tax on land (unlike other factors) has no effect on production.
Oct '10
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
Gaby, I realise you're much cleverer than me, and I'm really trying to understand what you're trying to get through to me, but-
The Ricardian Rent in that (10 apartment) situation would be the difference between the rent payable on that piece of land with that capital investment and the rent payable on a 'marginal' piece of land with that same capital investment. (Also, you have actually increased supply by 9 apartments.)
Ricardo extends his analysis into some careful recommendations about property taxes, as you note. But how do we get from here to market failure? More fundamentally, how do we move from conclusions from a Classical model to policy prescriptions using Neoclassical concepts?
Sep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
genferei, I'm not an economist! I'm simply saying that land is the subject of speculation because its supply is limited, which means the home rental market can't function properly. My example may be dud.
Sep '11
Re: Le Corbusier on the Bosphorus
It isn't just a normal return on investment. It far exceeds the outlay on building the apartments. It levers the value of the land.
I should very much like to live in a world where working people earned enough to pay for decent accommodation for themselves and their families, not too far from their place of work so that they have time to spend with their families, and with no need for subsidies. It doesn't work that way.
I don't know about public housing in Turkey (to return to topic) but it doesn't have to be inhuman and it doesn't have to deteriorate into squalid, dangerous slums. But it very easily can.