Cameron Sinclair
12/01/2005
In the wake of last winter’s Asian tsunami and the recent hurricane catastrophes in the U.S., we must ask ourselves: What if sustainable, renewable—not just basic—shelter were our benchmark for success in responding to disasters?
The tsunami hit 12 countries and forced 4 million from their homes. Hurricane Katrina displaced a million residents. Many of us who devote ourselves to relief and reconstruction have never seen suffering on this scale. Even as billions of dollars stream into our agencies, the background murmur is worrisome: How can we respond effectively and responsibly to such calamity?
In the aftermath of the tsunami, many relief agencies, faced with so much suffering and with pressure from donors to get something done, built the most basic temporary structures to provide short-term shelter, rather than working with communities to create long-term, sustainable habitats—sometimes at the expense of those who needed the most help.
In 1999, I cofounded a small not-for-profit, Architecture for Humanity, which seeks architectural solutions to humanitarian crises. Over the past six years, we’ve been involved in a number of projects, such as the development of mobile health clinics to combat HIV/AIDS in Africa.
We have seen thousands of pragmatic ideas for housing, infrastructure and sanitation projects from every corner of the globe. But with little funding, most have never made it off the drawing board, and only a handful have been implemented. Not one of these solutions has been scaled to the point where it has made a real difference. Yet every time disaster strikes, our office receives hundreds of requests for help. Without the means to evaluate and test these ideas, we risk exacerbating problems if we implement them during emergencies. Months after TV crews left Sri Lanka, children are still being taught under plastic tarps, waterborne diseases have spread through camps because of poor sanitation, and refugees have begun to deforest surrounding land for building materials. If we are serious about creating sustainable renewal in disaster zones, we need to introduce innovative solutions.
Next year, Architecture for Humanity and its partners will launch Rethinking Tent City, an international challenge to the creative world to examine ways to improve these settlements. But we also need new ways to distribute and implement these ideas where they are needed most. By giving away these ideas, we may be able to put access to humane shelter, sanitation, health care and education in reach of millions now excluded from them.
Open Architecture
Today there is no resource of proven design ideas that
can be freely distributed for nongovernment organizations to use, adapt and
implement in the field. Architecture for Humanity is in the initial stages of
developing the Open Source Architecture Network, an online database of
sustainable designs that can be used to respond to real-world situations. Using
the network, a relief group responding to flooding in China could identify past
projects dealing with flood zones, built or not, in areas with similar climactic
and geographical issues. Then they could connect with an experienced design team
to help tackle their situation with the benefit of shared insight.
Of
course, designers face a difficult choice in distributing their work freely so
that it can be used for the greater good while trying to protect it from being
exploited by others. This is where the work of a new system of intellectual
property rights, Creative Commons, and the idea of a “developing nations
license,” comes into play. We are working with Creative Commons to refine use
licenses that not only allow designers to determine the level of copyright for
their work, but also provide protection in the developed world. International
treaties would assure such agreements are enforceable almost anywhere.
The next 30 years of humanitarian relief must focus on community
engagement and sustainable renewal, not plastic tarps. The reconstruction and
design communities need to support innovative ideas and advocate for them both
locally and with funders. New avenues for collaboration need to be established,
and new systems of intellectual property protection devised that will let
designers protect their interests while meeting the needs of millions—perhaps
billions—for shelter, sanitation and, ultimately, a secure economic future.
| Cameron Sinclair is executive director of Architecture for Humanity and a contributing writer for www.worldchanging.com. |  |