Political domination and urban development: Altering the cultural identity of Tripoli's historic center

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2020

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This chapter outlines three different political systems of power (two periods of colonization and one dictatorship) in Libya and examines how they collectively contributed to the alteration of the urban form and cultural identity of Tripoli's historic center. Furthermore, this chapter illustrates how these three dominant political powers were able to change the historic center according to their interests while simultaneously suppressing participation from the different social groups (architects, planners, preservationists, engineers, citizens, etc.) that should have played a role in balancing planning processes and protecting the cultural legacy of the city. That these political powers were capable of nullifying these groups' participation complicates research into other cities facing systemic change found in the work of many Science and Technology Studies (STS) scholars. Works such as Aibar and Bijker's (1997) "Constructing a City" and Hommels's (2008) Unbuilding Cities highlight the power of social groups and their ability to resist changes to the design and configuration of cities, each providing examples of balanced planning processes that were not obstructed by dominant political powers. Although Hommels acknowledged that the balance of power within planning processes could shift, she claimed that a "careful study of unbuilding processes shows that rarely is it the case that a single actor 'has the power' to keep things as they are (or to change things)" (pp. 19-20). However, for countries in the Global South (regions outside of Europe and North America that are often politically and culturally marginalized) (Butler, 2008; Arrighi et al., 2003), the freedoms needed by social groups to participate in planning processes are stripped away by the dominant political power, leading to planning decisions controlled by singular political entities. This chapter highlights STS's failure to account for the effects these power structures can have on civic engagement and point to a severe gap in the current literature that needs to be addressed.

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Ejroushi, A. M. (2020). Political Domination and Urban Development: Altering the Cultural Identity of Tripoli’s Historic Center. In H. A. Nia., (Ed.), New Approaches in Contemporary Architecture and Urbanism (pp. 121-135). Alanya, Antalya: Cinius Yayınları https://doi.org/10.38027/N132020ICCAUA316286

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