“Social fabric” of the city in the mirror of architecture

Abstract

The relevance of the selected topic is determined by the fact that the city first and foremost is the center of culture and civilization, which characterizes the development of the surrounding territory and the entire country; secondly, it is the most vivid manifestation of social challenges that modern society is faced to solve. The goal of this research lies in tracing interrelation between the social problems of modern society and the architectural environment of the city. The subject of this article is the modern urban residential development, which is the center of people’s everyday life, as well as forms their attitude towards the city and the country overall. The theoretical framework is comprised of the basic provisions of urban studies presented by the Western and Russian authors: F. Braudel, A. Gutnov, G. Simmel, L. Wirth, R. Park, G. Revzin, F. Urban, C. Ellard, and others. The author proves that the development of capitalist relations in the XX century posed a problem of large-scale housing development, which had to meet the two key requirements: a) be affordable for the consumer; b) be profitable for the property developer. Industrialization, unification and typification of construction became the way to solve this task – the modern urban neighborhood units, slums of industrial and postindustrial era, in which there is neither past nor future alongside social hierarchy and local community united by common goals and values. Having assessed this phenomenon, the author proves that living in such environment aggravates the social, spiritual, and psychological problems of citizens, described by the classics of urban studies. Therefore, the main conflict of modern city is the clash between the economic efficiency of housing development and the aesthetic requirements for the organization of residential environment. This conflict goes beyond the framework of architecture due to the fact that the principles of industrialization, unification, and typification are now universal to all spheres of social life, including culture.