Mini Essay-Spatial Justice

Justice is always a topic of discussion under controversy among the public, which is related to almost every aspect, such as space, race, law and so on. At the same time, there is no doubt that the Spatial Justice plays an important role because of its tight connection with the physical living environment in which human live. What does Spatial Justice concern? As Edward W. Soja mentioned in his book called The City and Spatial Justice, “In the broadest sense, spatial (in)justice refers to an intentional and focused emphasis on the spatial or geographical aspects of justice and injustice. As a starting point, this involves the fair and equitable distribution in space of socially valued resources and the opportunities to use them.”

The words used above, such as fair, equitable, socially valued resources, remind us of the Marxism. One of Marx’s arguments is that he believed that capitalism will destroy itself, because the proletariat would revolt and produce what society needs. This would give economic equality to all the population and for this to happen there would not be private property and this will cause social classes to disappear. This would bring an equal share of goods and services. It is easy for us to find that social classes would disappear and the goods and services would be shared equally, from the foreseeable future, which is an ideal status or a utopia. While when architects design the space, there is no place reaching that desirable condition. That is to say, society is still divided between the rich and the poor. Theoretically, it is simple to mix the poor and rich, which is unwise and cause more problems compared with its benefits. Based on the data collected from the experimental study call Moving to Opportunity Study led by HUD, boys in the families that were allowed to move out of the high-poverty suffered from higher mental health problem and engaged in more antisocial behavior after ten to fifteen years observation. Hence, it is not the moment for us to force both of the rich and poor to accept Spatial Justice.

Then the question come out, that is, when the social class still exist and the ideal Spatial Justice would create much worse things, what can we do to solve the horrible unfair situation. My point is never forgetting any community. To be more specific, we should improve the life quality of each community based its context instead of focusing on one community. I believe that people live in a bad neighborhood want to escape from poverty and live in a better neighborhood, but I still do not think it is good for them to be sent to a good neighborhood directly. As an architect, what we can do is improving the life quality of the slum by creating some socially responsive architectures (Rural Studio written by Samuel Mockbee ), which can provide people living in these areas with more chances to have a better life and make themselves better. Then they will escape from the poverty naturally and merge themselves with their desired communities in an easier way.

Finally, I would like to come to the conclusion that spatial justice is important, but it is impossible to be that ideal status. Comparing with working hard to try to make all people share the same place, the wiser way is never abandoning any community and help people merge with other communities naturally with all the existing communities still existing.