The Place of Sustainability

During the first decade of the 2000s, I grew dissatisfied with the state of architecture, which had become overly focused on form, taking to the extremes the principles of postmodernism and deconstructivism that had shaped the architectural discourse in the previous century. With the definitive capillary diffusion of CAD technologies, since the early 2000s, or shortly before, new formal possibilities offered by alternative geometries and new modes of digital expression offered architects the possibility to easily break any tie between architecture and the physical environment. The souls of architects often got lost as they freely roamed the unlimited digital horizons. Editors of specialized magazines and books didn’t miss the opportunity to ride this new wave of digital expressionism in architecture, which had its worldwide celebration at the 9th International Architecture Exhibition in Venice, Italy, 2004.^[1] As I absorbed the recent technological news and curiosity, I started to wonder about the growing gap between concrete and abstract values in architecture. The growing gap led me to lose confidence in specialized architectural magazines, journals, books, and exhibitions. I cancelled my subscriptions to over a dozen architectural magazines and journals and shifted my focus to more concrete and global issues. Despite being an architect, I began to distance myself from architecture as my primary domain of expertise. In 2014, far from being merely a personal feeling, I formalized this new awareness as a turn from space to place at an interdisciplinary conference in Oxford, UK, a decade after the international exposition held in Venice (see the paper From Space to Place: A Necessary Paradigm Shift in Architecture as a Way to Handle the Increasing Complexity and Connectivity of Real-World Systems).

During those years, while architects explored virtual worlds and spaces, a growing number of professionals refocused on the physical context of architecture, acknowledging the complex environmental reality shaped by physicochemical, biological, and ecological processes, in addition to the traditional concerns about social and symbolic processes (all architectural -isms ultimately belong to the realm of abstract, intellectual, or symbolic processes through which architects try to comply with the reality of facts). In that paper, I argued that a new ecological awareness, particularly among architects, has facilitated a shift from the abstractness of space back to the concreteness of place – a process that is still ongoing. To begin my journey on the planet-sustainability, I started by reading books on sustainable architecture, green architecture, passive architecture, ecological architecture, and similar topics. Initially, I was plagued by doubts about the legitimacy of the new wave of architectural environmentalism, which emerged in the early 2000s, particularly in the context of ‘sustainable architecture’. After decades of postmodernism, deconstructivism, and various other -isms that attempted to capture the impact of digital technologies on architecture, I wondered if this new thread was merely a fleeting fad for architects and the building sector. Unable to find answers within the architecture and building domains (you cannot ask grocers if the fruit they sell is tasty), I had to venture beyond and explore the broader implications of environmentalism and ecologism. This led me to reflect on the connections between these concepts and architecture, moving beyond traditional sociocultural and symbolic values centered on the human agency. Thus, my current journey began, navigating the concrete aspects of place and the abstractness of space. At the time, this shift in perspective was a difficult choice, as it would likely influence my design approach. However, I couldn’t ignore what I perceived as a patent truth: it was clear to me that environmental awareness had to draw ‘a proper epistemological line of demarcation for disciplines like architecture and urban planning’, to use the words of Professor Nicola Emery.^[3] The question then became: how could I navigate the unfamiliar terrain of environmental and ecological issues and uncover the fundamental connections – cultural, philosophical, and scientific – between this new appreciation for nature, architecture, and planning? That was an unknown universe for me: How do you orient yourself in a territory or place that you do not know? You likely need a guide or map, so I created it–a basic map of facts and events to investigate the concept of sustainability.

Here you can download the vectorial map.pdf that you see as the Featured Image of this article. Clicking on the map’s icons or text will redirect you to the websites hosting the original documents, reports, papers, charts, histories, or institutions that have contributed to shape our current understanding of the relationship between humans and nature. Active links to official documents, reports, papers, declarations, charters, Institutions, events etc. can also be found in the section below.

**Image 1:** elaboration based on a wood engraving by an unknown artist, first documented in Camille Flammarion’s book, *L’atmosphere:* *météorologie populaire*, 1888.

What follows is the text I wrote in 2011, the time I made that map, to illustrate the reasons for it.

Nowadays everything has to be green and sustainable. Things that are neither green nor sustainable, can become green and sustainable by means of conscious or unconscious green-washing operations. The vast amount of information from traditional media like books, television, newspapers, and magazines combined with the even greater amount of information that we can get from digital media make our way to get oriented between the many folds of environmental or ecological thinking very difficult, especially since green messages are often contradictory, if not misleading or false, and rarely supported by accurate scientific reasoning based on official sources. The speed of information, which is a typical trait of our contemporary society, coupled with the plain adoption of immediate information that we can get from generic internet searches (where web-pages are indexed on the basis of algorithms that follow market logic) often results in a superficial attitude increasing confusion and uncertainties in dealing with such a ticklish argument — the human relation to the physical environment. People involved in the production of culture, have the responsibility to pursue their research as thoroughly as possible to avoid inaccuracies and incongruities. Mapping the place of sustainability is a possible way to illustrate a green universe yet to be discovered; it’s a kind of astronomical map that defines the relations and connections between some epochal events that gave birth to institutions, lines of thought, scientific and official documents, all of which aimed to redefine humanity’s relationship with nature and our sense of dwelling on Planet Earth.

Like any map, this is just a faint image of reality; nonetheless, it gave me the confidence to explore a new world — a new domain of knowledge concerning the profound connection between humans and nature — without getting lost. I conceived its basic structure after reading the book ‘Nature’s Economy’, written by Donald Worster, a distinguished American Professor specialized in the history of ecological ideas.^[4] Somewhat arbitrarily, I chose 1945 as a starting point, the year when nuclear bombs brought the Second World War to an end (in hindsight, this was a fortunate choice: at the time I was unaware of the Anthropocene debate, which later identified the mid-20th century as the precise beginning of a new geological epoch shaped by human activity), while I put the central focus around the end of the ‘60s and early ‘70s, when mankind, for the very first time, had the opportunity to see the Planet Earth as a whole, from the distance and the outside — thus, the period I cover with the map is what Worster defined ‘The Age of Ecology’.^[5] Regrettably, for the sake of simplicity and communicative intent regarding the general readability of the map and its scope, I had to exclude some important layers, which, at first, I wanted to include: I’m speaking of those literary, philosophical, ethical, and scientific works that especially contributed to develop the proper milieu to support the related cases for environmentalism and sustainability, as we know them now (I refer to the works of Gilbert White, Charles Darwin, Henry David Thoreau, John Ruskin, Ernst Haeckel, Alfred N. Whitehead, Arthur G. Tansley, William M. Wheeler, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, Eugene Odum, Barry Commoner, Jeremy Rifkin, Hans Jonas, Michel Serres and many others, many of whom are the extended subject of the aforementioned book by D. Worster); I’m also speaking of other events or institutions that played some role in the environmental debate, but I couldn’t include without undermining the immediacy and readability of the map. Despite those limits, I began to consider that map as an inclusive and open map, where many layers could be added and overlap the underlying structure, maybe modifying the disposition of its parts to allow room for other parts – events or entities – but maintaining its main focuses and the fundamental connections, and creating new ones (like an organism whose degree of complexity can grow through time).^[6]

Dates, Places, Events, and Useful Links

16 July 1945, Alamogordo, New Mexico, USA — The First Atomic Bomb Blast, (Trinity Test); a brief video here.

2 September 1945, Tokyo Bay, JAPAN — The end of WWII was formally signed, aboard the United States Navy battleship USS Missouri, after Japanese Emperor Hirohito already had announced the Japanese surrender to Allied Forces on the national radio, on 15 August 1945.

16 October 1945, Québec City, CANADA — 42 countries gathered in the Château Frontenac, Québec, Canada, to create FAO — the Food and Agriculture Organization.

24 October 1945, Washington, USA — The United Nations (UN ) officially came into existence, after the Charter of The United Nations was adopted and signed on 26 June 1945, in San Francisco. ‘The name “United Nations”, coined by United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt was first used in the Declaration by United Nations of 1 January 1942, during the Second World War, when representatives of 26 nations pledged their Governments to continue fighting together against the Axis Powers’.

16 November 1945, London, UK — The Constitution of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) was signed, after a United Nations Conference was convened in London from 1 to 16 November 1945.

17 December 1946, Paris, FRANCE — The first movement of European spirit (European Federalists Union) was founded; months before, on 19 September 1946, Winston Churchill already called for a ‘kind of United States of Europe’ in a speech he gave at the University of Zurich. On 18 April 1951, the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC), was established by six founding members — Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands —, who signed the Treaty of Paris. On 25 March 1957, the six members signed the Treaty of Rome, setting up the European Economic Community (EEC), which on 1 November 1993, after the Treaty of Maastricht, became the European Union (EU).

5 October 1948, Fontainebleau, FRANCE — The International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (hereinafter referred to as IUCN) was established.

23 March 1950 — Entry into force of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), which in 1951 became a specialized agency of the United Nations.

28 January 1951, Geneva, SWITZERLAND — The Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) was founded.

29 April 1961, Morges, SWITZERLAND — World Wildlife Fund (WWF) was founded.

22 April 1970 — The first Earth Day was celebrated.

1970, Vancouver, CANADA — The Canadian ‘Don’t Make a Wave Committee’ against US nuclear tests on Amchitka Island was officially established; ‘In 1971, a small group of activists set sail to the Amchitka island off Alaska to try and stop a US nuclear weapons test…, their old fishing boat was called “The Greenpeace”.’ In 1972 the movement and organization known as Greenpeace was officially founded.

5-16 June 1972, Stockholm, SWEDEN — The United Nations Conference on the Human Environment convened under United Nations auspices, takes place in Stockholm.

15 December 1972 — The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) was established by General Assembly resolution 2997 (XXVII)

12-23 February 1979, Geneva, SWITZERLAND — The First World Climate Conference (WCC-1), sponsored by the WMO and other international bodies, took place.

1980 — The World Conservation Strategy (WCS) was published; it provides both an intellectual framework and practical guidance for the maintenance of essential ecological processes and life-support systems, preservation of genetic diversity and sustainable development.

19 December 1983 — The General Assembly of the UN ‘welcomed the establishment of a special commission that should make available a report on environment and the global problematique to the year 2000 and beyond. The commission later adopted the name World Commission on Environment and Development’ (WCED). The Chairperson of the Commission was the Prime Minister of Norway, Gro Harlem Brundtland.

22 March 1985, Vienna, AUSTRIA — Conference of Plenipotentiaries on the Protection of the Ozone Layer, otherwise stated as ‘Vienna Convention’.

4 August 1987 — Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED).

16 September 1987, Montreal, CANADA — The international treaty known as ‘the Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer’ (a protocol to the Vienna Convention) was open for signature.

6 December 1988 — The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was set up, endorsed by UNEP and WHO. It provides at regular intervals assessment reports (AR) on the state of knowledge on climate change.

26-28 April 1989, Helsinki, FINLAND — First meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-1) to the Vienna Convention on the Protection of the Ozone Layer.

2-5 May 1989, Helsinki, FINLAND — First meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol (MOP-1).

1990, IPCC First Assessment Report 1990 (FAR) — First Scientific Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

27 June 1990, Brussels, BELGIUM — Green Paper on the Urban Environment by the Commission of the European Communities.

27-29 June 1990, London, UNITED KINGDOM — Second meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol (MOP-2).

29 October – 7 November 1990, Geneva, SWITZERLAND — Second World Climate Conference (WCC-2).

17-19 June 1991, Nairobi, KENYA — Second meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-2) to the Vienna Convention on the Protection of the Ozone Layer.

October 1991, Gland, SWITZERLAND — ‘Caring for the Earth: A Strategy for Sustainable Living’ was published.

3-14 June 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) known as ‘The Earth Summit’ took place in Rio de Janeiro.

June 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was open for signature. The Convention sets an overall framework for intergovernmental efforts to tackle the challenge posed by climate change due to emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. The UNFCCC entered into force on 21 March 1994.

June 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD) was open for signature.

June-August 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — Rio Declaration on Environment and Development.

June-August 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — UN Statement of Forest Principles.

June 1992, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — Agenda 21 , a comprehensive plan of actions developed to lead environmental development into the 21st century with its goal of sustainable life on Earth, was adopted.

27 May 1994, Aalborg, DENMARK — First European Conference on Sustainable Cities & Towns. The ‘Aalborg Charter’, which provides a framework for local sustainable development and calls for local authorities to engage in Local Agenda 21 processes, was signed.

28 November – 9 December 1994, Nassau, BAHAMAS — First meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-1) to the Convention on Biological Diversity.

17 June 1994, Paris, FRANCE — The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) was adopted. It entered into force on 26 December 1996.

1995 – Second Scientific Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — Second Assessment Report (SAR): Climate Change 1995.

28 March – 7 April 1995, Berlin, GERMANY — First meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-1) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

29 September – 15 October 1997, Rome, ITALY — First meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-1) to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD).

1-12 December 1997, Kyoto, JAPAN — Third meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-3) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. The Parties agreed on the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol, which entered into force on 16 February 2005.

2001 – Third Scientific Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — Third Assessment Report (TAR): Climate Change 2001.

26 August – 4 September 2002, Johannesburg, SOUTH AFRICA — World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD), where the ‘Johannesburg Declaration’ on sustainable development was adopted.

June 2004, Aalborg, DENMARK — Fourth European Conference on Sustainable Cities & Towns – Aalborg+10 (2004)

2007 – Fourth Scientific Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — Fourth Assessment Report (AR4): Climate Change 2007.

31 August – 4 September 2009, Geneva, SWITZERLAND — Third World Climate Conference (WCC-3).

May 2010, Dunkerque, FRANCE — Sixth European Conference on Sustainable Cities & Towns – Dunkerque 2010.

18-29 October 2010, Nagoya, JAPAN — 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-10) to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.

10-21 October 2011, Changwon, REPUBLIC OF KOREA — 10th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-10) to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification.

21-25 November 2011, Bali, INDONESIA — 9th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-9) to the Vienna Convention.

28 November – 9 December 2011, Durban, SOUTH AFRICA — 17th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-17) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

20-22 June 2012, Rio de Janeiro, BRAZIL — United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), where the outcome document ‘The Future We Want’ was endorsed.

Notes

[1] The 9th International Architecture Exhibition: “METAMORPH”, directed by Kurt W. Forster, 12 September – 7 November 2004.

[2] By the term ‘environmentalism’ we mean ‘a new moral consciousness’ which began to take form after 1945 under the threat of the atomic bomb, and ‘whose purpose was to use the insights of ecology to restrain the use of modern science-based power over nature’; in Donald Worster, Nature’s Economy, A History of Ecological Ideas (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 343-44. As for the term ‘ecology’, which was coined by the German biologist Ernst Haeckel in 1869, it has a wider meaning and scopes: ‘the word “ecology” is derived from the Greek “oikos”, meaning “household”, and “logos”, meaning “study”. Thus, the study of the environmental house includes all the organisms in it and all the functional processes that make the house habitable. Literally, then, ecology is the study of “life at home” with emphasis on “the totality or pattern of relations between organism and their environment” to cite a standard dictionary definition’, in Eugene P. Odum and Gary W. Barrett, Fundamentals of Ecology, fifth edition (Belmont: Thomson Brooks/Cole Publishing Company, 2005), 2.

[3] In Nicola Emery, L’Architettura Difficile: Filosofia del Costruire (Milano: Christian Marinotti Edizioni, 2007), 167. The translation from Italian into English is mine.

[4] Donald Worster, Nature’s Economy, A History of Ecological Ideas (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994).

[5] Ibid., 342.

[6] If some reader is interested and wants to contribute, expand or modify this work (which covers the period 1945–2012), I can send the source file, made with Illustrator. The ultimate intent would be to create a three-dimensional interactive map, where the reader can navigate in, turning on and off certain layers, so that complexity and readability can go hand in hand.