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City, Horizons of Involvement, Praxis

This submission is a sole-authored Commissioned Chapter – c. 6000 words - in Chipperfield, Long and Bose, 'Common Ground, a critical reader'.

The methodology is Phenomenological Hermeneutics - a philosophical argument that builds 'city' from our modes of involvement and the manner in which their institutional horizons acknowledge the claim of the ultimately anonymous common-to-all.

The contribution to knowledge is to outline the ontology of urban order, taking the Biennale theme of “Common Ground” as an ethical, before an architectural, paradigm. This essay is a preliminary formulation of some of the core themes for the CASS PhD in Architecture Programme, "Practical Wisdom". This is a new programme, whose research profile is just developing. It expands upon material initiated at Cambridge, taking advantage of the CASS interest in the culture and significance of architectural practice. The themes were part of conversations with the organisers of that Biennale, David Chipperfield and Kieran Long.

The book served as a “reader” for the Venice Architectural Biennale of 2012, developing the philosophical-theoretical background for that year’s exhibition. The Biennale became somewhat controversial, as, for example, Mark Wigley and Peter Eisenman expressed the fear in a public lecture at Columbia University that the ideals of that Biennale represented a threat to post-structuralist formalism and a return to Post-Modernism.