Who owns the city?

Being from a different country, every discussion on topics of human rights, architecture, politics and city, makes me wonder how the situations in the east and the west are different. The way people occupy space, the juggle between authority and ownership, the contrast of everyday life and freedom of thought and life makes me the contrast between two unique places in time.

Strategy over Tactics

The first example is Charleston; a familiar environment to most of us. It has a distinctive built environment with a strong cultural and historical background. The BAR at Charleston also identifies this unique situation and has a stronghold in the historic district. The rights as the user of those properties are controlled and governed by a set of rules.

Tactics over strategy

As a contrasting scenario, Chandni Chowk, is a 17^th century historic district and market in New Delhi. It has gone through a lot of change throughout; significantly the densification after the India Pakistan partition but the mixed community has thrived with the market. The space has always been owned by the people and hence the built fabric has adapted, changed, and sometimes suffered but at the same time, people have flourished.

Coming back to the initial aspect of contrast, it makes me think of the advantages and disadvantages of both scenarios. It’s understandable that painting the space with just either one of these ideas does leave out a lot of opportunities for the other.  The ownership that tactics give as a right to the user, adds the character of life and at the same time, the strategy allows shaping spaces. Is a balance between these two ideas, something we are ready to handle?