The Socialist Town. Homogeneity, individualisation, isolation.

The unprecedented scale of transformations of the urban world is not in the least the apanage of the socialist model, as it was put into practice in the Eastern European countries. But, some characteristics of these regimes are the absolute authority of the state over the urban operations (thus leading to the complete disappearance of the equilibrium between the private and the public interests), the elimination of the individual initiative in various areas including the construction field and the social project of uniformisation tightly linked to the utopia of a scientific planning that is both global and perfect.

The socialist block of flats (in fact, as different as possible from the antebellic ?apartment building? and the ?condominium?) represents the fundamental unity of architecture and town planning of that period, being adapted and transformed according to new models. Two of them are typical of the entire communist region: the pompous Stalinist model of the ?building units? inspired by the classical town planning, and the big districts outside the traditional town ? like Drumul Taberei in Bucharest built according to reinterpreted modern formulas. The design of the latter is due both to the development of industrialisation and standardisation of the construction elements and to the context of relative ?liberalisation? and opening toward the Western models.

What is typical of Romania, and, seems not be found anywhere else in the urban policies of the Central European countries is the massive intervention on the town centres, starting with the 70s. The already traditional image of bigger villages, ?incoherent? and with an improperly built fond was what firstly triggered the destruction of the old urban tissues and the building of new districts on the places that remained empty. It is noteworthy that, in general, the historical town centres from Transilvania survived, squeezed between blocks of flats and industries while the radical restructuring concentrated upon extra-Carpathian towns.

As to Bucharest?s centre, the interventions of the first phase consisted of the modernisation of some of the main arteries, and their ?panelling? with fronts of blocks. Then followed the well-known operations of the 80s, with their endless line of demolitions and raise of the magnificent and personal ?Forbidden City?. I shall not resume here the discussion on the character of systematic delirium of Ceauşescu?s project and its effects. But I think that we should insist more on the evolution of the relation between the city-dwellers and the urban space and on the mechanisms of resistance to the great project of homogeneity- and discipline-infliction.