Med branjem intervjuja z Benedictom Singletonom v Glass Bead smo se spomnili zgornje intervencije.
Zoki oziroma njegov PR tim je že takrat adekvatno odvrnil, da je dilanje za vsako upravljanje mesta (kot podjetja) nujno potrebno oziroma da je preizkusni kamen crafty župana ravno v njegovi zmožnosti dilanja. Na kar je mogoče odvrniti zgolj: touché.
Sledi daljši Singletonov citat, ki Jankovićev argument dodatno izostri (poudarki v boldu so Smetnjakovi), case study pa so, jasno, Stožice.
“Keller’s talk of McKinsey consultants and World Bank orgmen as vectors of contemporary urban forms makes me think of the city as a zone of deals. Discussed in the terms of the economic theories favored by such agents, the deal is framed as a matter of mutual benefit, self-interest, fair exchange; but it appears quite differently when refracted through the kinds of ideas I’ve previously outlined.
I’m reminded of the strikingly original way that the anthropologist Mary Helms, whose work has been an abiding influence on my own, describes a level at which design and trade become equivalent. Rather than assuming the former simply provides the material for the latter, the two practices become comparable when they’re seen as acts of negotiating an ambiguous environment, one traversed by complex and partially concealed forces, in order to procure an object. Put very simply, the intelligence with which the artisan approaches their materials is mirrored in the art of dealing with strangers in the marketplace. In this link we can observe how design grades into the soft power of branding and diplomacy, but we can pursue the connection further with regard to the deal, I think.
The deal is a commitment or pledge to which you will be held by exterior forces, in this case at least one other person. The agreement that finds expression in a deal, whether it is as a signatory on paper or registered in a shared glance (neither is necessarily the more binding), is an explicit alignment of multiple agendas. This fixes a degree of predictability in the articulated relationship—an alliance, however brief, which in turn can be built on by all concerned. But the full range of this pact’s ramifications is not given in advance, and the real terms of a deal might only become visible later, as its ultimate implications begin to surface–perhaps in ways to be celebrated, perhaps not. I’m fond of the way a deal’s basic structure, and the dawning awareness of its delayed implications, are both compacted into the phrase shaking hands.
Cities are the psychological epicenter of this procedure, the place where deals proliferate and stakes become extravagant. They are accordingly rich with typologies of ascent and shipwreck, trouble and oasis. This quality seems inherent to the city. Its enduring richness as a model of the maximally artificial environment, compared to say the submarine or spaceship, is not just a function of its scale and heterogeneity. These latter qualities are themselves a function of the city’s generative paradox: a bounded space, but open to the outside; a stable zone, but predicated on arrivals and departures. Such an environment is configured to continually test expectations. Think of the marketplace, where deals are done with figures from afar, whose motives may be as dubious as their standards are unfamiliar, and are prone to disappear when called upon to uphold their side of the bargain. Indeed, Helms writes of the historical and geographical frequency with which this quality of urban marketplaces has been extrapolated into rumors that they are haunted, comprising a gateway to the unfamiliar Outside–where nothing can be relied upon to be as it seems––situated at the heart of a settlement. Although stated in very different––and far more abstract–terms, I suspect the reconceptualization of the market by the philosopher of finance Elie Ayache runs along compatible lines: the market not primarily as a zone of exchange, but the mechanism that resets our models of the world. ‘The medium of contingency,’ as he calls this proving-ground. The city as the substrate and product of this medium has yet to be explored.
Foto: rtvslo, dnevnik
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