… there are positive things…
by Austin Williams
It seems like a lifetime ago – but it is only six weeks since Donald Trump was inaugurated. Remember Kamala Harris, anyone? The 47th US president’s first official act was to re-issue a federal action, titled “Promoting Beautiful Federal Civic Architecture”. This Executive Order was the first of what we now realise was the start of an avalanche of imperial mandates – that have changed the perception of the United States. For good or ill, his bluntness has also caused a fundamental shakeup in the rest of the world. If you recall, it all started with a demand that all civic buildings “should be visually identifiable… and respect regional, traditional, and classical architectural heritage in order to uplift and beautify public spaces and ennoble the United States.”
The immediate reaction was an “I-told-you-so” by the so-called “progressive” creative classes. The accepted opinion was that this single document represented the re-awakening of “the next global dictatorship”. Within no time at all, there was yet another flurry of articles identifying “echoes of fascist architecture” and memes of Nazi rallies amidst Corinthian columns. Of course, classical-stylisation is not to everyone’s taste… but grow up.
Political commentator, Tom Slater says, anyone who thinks Elon Musk is a fascist “needs to get a grip”, and indeed Musk has publicly demanded that “racism of any kind” should cease. But for now, the populist shift in realpolitik continues regardless: from Farage’s Reform to Giorgia Meloni of Italy. It is fair to say that these representatives, like President Trump himself, were elected by popular mandate not by authoritarian coup. Trump won more votes than any Republican in history. Of course, that hasn’t stopped the characterisation. Meanwhile, love them or hate them, the dodgy AfD came second in the recent German democratic elections.
By the way, I’m no fan of Trump – quite the opposite – but shouldn’t we recognise the importance of his democratic mandate and the populist turn? Conversely, I also recognise when freedom and liberty are under attack, and even if JD Vance’s humiliation of Zelensky was reprehensible, I agree with him that the erosion of liberal values is not coming from the direction that many people suspect. Surely, it is important that we retain our critical faculties to accept and defend the good stuff while eschewing the bad. To do otherwise is to be a close-minded sectarian.
For example, I disapprove of vice-President Vance’s views on abortion, but I cheered when I heard his speech at the Munich Security Conference, where he launched a stinging attack on EU’s clampdown on free speech. It was not an attack on democracy as it has been caricatured, it was a well-lobbed accusation that there wasn’t enough of it. Without realising the irony, many observers, including German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius spluttered that Vance’s comments were “not acceptable”. Indeed, all too often, the response to speech with which we disagree is to close it down, or ridicule it, rather than arguing for more speech by which to challenge it.
But it is Trump’s attack on the EDI movement (or DEI as they call it in the USA) that has been the most heartening. His blizzard of Executive Orders terminating “radical DEI preferencing in federal contracting” or “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity” and much more, may be transactional, but these legislative documents have reverberated across the country and further afield. Companies like Arcelor Mittel, JPMorgan, Mercedes-Benz, etc are dropping their commitment to ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) pledges. Blackrock, the world’s biggest asset management company has quit the industry’s Net Zero climate organisation. Goldman Sachs, PepsiCo, Google and Amtrak amongst many others are rolling back their EDI initiatives. It has taken Trump – the man-baby – to point out that the EDI Emperor has no clothes, and it seems that more and more people are breathing a sigh of relief at being released from EDI’s grip. And the world of architecture could do with taking note. I have just finished editing a pamphlet on the topic and Trump’s administration’s dismantling of the EDI industry is an opportunity for us to reassess its regressive impact on our industry.
Trump is not just dismantling “woke” culture, he’s dismantling the postwar consensus. In the last few months, it has become a less stable world, and so it’s no surprise that people are worried. Stability is good, but the shakeup of a decrepit system has been a long time coming. EDI is part of the problem. Undoubtedly, it sounds good: who can complain about equality, for example. But under EDI rules, ‘equality’ has morphed into unequal advantage, ‘diversity’ represents only one permissible opinion, and ‘inclusion’ is at the expense of excluding dissenters.
US architect, Adam N Mayer says, “the architecture profession is prone to what some call ‘progressive politics’ or what other observers might call ‘do-gooder syndrome’.” That do-gooding – exemplified by EDI niceties – which many architects think is a radical intervention in local community organisation or society more widely, is often “not doing good” at all. Just as the Trade Union Congress’ mandatory “EDI awareness and training for all staff” means that an organisation set up to represent workers’ interests now works hand-in-glove with employers to discipline their members, so the Architects Registration Board will disbar architects and invalidate courses found to be in contravention of its EDI tickbox policies.
Over the years, architects has transformed themselves from radical outsiders to cosy insiders. Nowadays, their remit is governed by social policy concerns, from environmentalism to cycling to community cohesion. Ironically, they like to believe that they are open-minded and with a finger on the pulse of the public mood, but time and time again they have been revealed as tin-eared to public concerns. From Brexit to the Green New Deal, from insisting on “the right values” to advocating for bamboo, rammed earth and heat pumps, architects have clearly misread or misrepresented the mood of the country. In his inimitable style, Patrik Schumacher points out that architecture is disconnected from the real world, decrying an “increasingly incestuous academic culture of dilettante distraction”.
Of course, architects have to navigate a strained relationship with the public: wanting to represent their desires and yet hoping to educate them about better possibilities- to provide solutions that clients didn’t know were possible. In practical and professional matters, architects can certainly offer creative solutions. But in a society where the public is worried about paying the bills, walking on eggshells for fear of causing offence, where free expression is constrained by politicised codes of conduct, and where risk-aversion dominates, no wonder ordinary people are less enamoured by what restrictive practices architects have to offer.
We have to keep a watchful eye on the American administration and condemn its illiberal excesses, but if a knock-on effect of Trump’s actions can challenge the EDI status quo, then he deserves two cheers. Architects might then begin to appreciate the potential of their profession as a liberal, rather than a patronising, intolerant and restrictive art.
Austin Williams, series editor of Five Critical Essays on EDI
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