The Unknown Cities: From Loss of Hope to Well-Being [And] Self-Satisfaction

By Abeer Elshater and Hisham G. Abusaada

This book investigates the many relatively unknown Egyptian cities, which research has largely ignored. It seeks to enhance the livability of urban areas and stop the processes that turn residents into anti-utopians and their cities into dystopias. It examines urbanization patterns in what are currently rural or informal settlements. It draws on concepts from Western and Arabic thought concerning idealism and utopianism, linking anti-utopianism with ideas such as loss of hope and residents right to the city. It also investigates the epistemology and methodology of urban design, using the descriptive-analytical approach to evaluate methods of self-criticism to address the problems and enhance urban planning and design. The literature regarding ten-minute neighborhoods is reviewed, along with a comparative content analysis of online articles, and the resultant principles are tested through site observation. It is found that happiness can be promoted by the principle of ten-minute pedestrian access to essential services, which can viably guide the reformation of urban planning. This work recommends that urban planning should be based on the ten-minute neighborhood, thus improving the future prospects of utopianism in Egypts unknown cities.

Recently, in the first decade of the twenty-first century, there was a definite human crisis that emerged in the Egyptian cities at the level of local urban communities, which reflects on the whole city and the attached ones. The problem seems to be in the transformation of some urban sites in the metropolitan [and small] cities to become dystopian places, regarding the dynamic impact of the anti-utopian people. The concept of anti-utopians stands as an intermediate step between livable cities and dystopian communities through the transformation that occurs due to the lack of strategic plans by the administrators and/or the experts, with a special mention to the plans for poor people. Therefore, from our perspective, there is an urgent need to say that the majority of Egyptian cities should be declared as domains of humanitarian disasters, which are caused by human hazards rather than the natural disasters, e.g. earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, whirlwinds, and hurricanes. Thus, the first/headmost city that will announce its failure in the structural and human scene will get the self-respect and worlds estimate as well.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Africa
• Release date: Apr 22, 2016
• ISBN: 9781482862294

Abeer Elshater

Abeer Elshater is an associate professor at Ain Shams University. She was born in 1976 in Egypt. She obtained her BSc in urban design and spatial planning in 1999 from Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt. In 2009, she received her PhD in urban design from the same university. Since then, she has acted as an assistant professor then an associate professor, teaching and supervising multidisciplinary topics in urban planning and design. She has worked on some international research projects with international universities. In 2011, she joined the program Integrated Urbanism & Sustainable Design (IUSD) as a teaching staff and academic adviser of post-graduate students. She has published a book entitled Urban Design Paradigm, as well as thirteen scientific manuscripts in international journals and periodicals. She is a vice director of Contagious Improvement of Quality Assurance Unit (CIQAU) at Faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams University (ASU). Her official e-mail is [e-mail]. Hisham M. G. Abusaada is currently professor of architecture and urban design in architecture and housing research institute, Housing and Building National Research Center HBRC, Cairo, Egypt. He taught in the urban design program in the department of landscape architecture at King Faisal University, Saudi Arabia, from 1995 to 2004, and in several Egyptian Universities, and higher institutions. He is an architect and urban designer, educator, and author of numerous books and articles on the urban design. He has more than thirty-five issued scientific papers and sixtieth essays in Arabic and Egyptian magazine. He concerns with the sociocultural aspects and special problems of the urban community and development project. He has several published books i.e., (1) The Art of the City, Refutation of Intellectual Discourse toward Knowledge Enlightenment, Partridge Publishing Africa, A Penguin Random House Company, South Africa, 2015; (2) Topics in Landscape Architecture profession, academic book, Cairo, Egypt, 2007; (3) Post Occupancy Evaluation, translated book, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, King Faisal University, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2004; and (4) Efficiency and Urban Form Generation, approach to site planning and design, Academic Book, Cairo, Egypt, 1992.

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Copyright © 2016 by Abeer Elshater and Hisham G. Abusaada.

ISBN:      Hardcover      978-1-4828-6228-7

                Softcover       978-1-4828-6230-0

                eBook            978-1-4828-6229-4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

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CONTENTS

Preface

I Hope as a Keyword

II Ernst Bloch and the Principle of Hope

III No—where, Non-existent Ideal Imagined Society and Heterotopias

IV Utopia: City Ruled by Philosophers

V Dystopia: the Corrupt City Imagination

VI The Gist of Anti-Utopian

VII The Urban Age: Concept, Phenomenon, and Property

VIII The Essence of the City

IX The Arts of Change: From the Right to the City to the Rebel Cities

X The Unknown Egyptian Cities–Sites

XI Is Anti-Utopia an Authentic Concept to Define the Egyptian Reality?

XII Is the Egyptian Status Quo a Dystopia or Anti-Utopia affairs? Urban Criticism

XIII A Domain of Humanitarian Disaster

XIV Towards Visionary and Inspirational Plans

XV Is Cairo a Happy City?

XVI Subjective Well-Being and Self-Satisfaction

XVII Egypt and Ten-Minute Neighborhood toward Well-Being [and] Self-Satisfaction

XVIII Proposal for a Subjective Well-Being in Ten-Minute Neighborhood

XIX Future Outlook

XX Bibliography

Abeer Elshater is an associate professor at Ain Shams University. She was born in 1976 in Egypt. She obtained her BSc in urban design and spatial planning in 1999 from Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt. In 2009, she received her Ph.D. in urban design from the same university. Since then, she has acted as an assistant professor then an associate professor, teaching and supervising multidisciplinary topics in urban planning and design. She has worked on some international research projects with international universities. In 2011, she joined the program Integrated Urbanism & Sustainable Design—IUSD as a teaching staff and academic adviser of post-graduate students. She has published a book entitled Urban Design Paradigm, as well as thirteen scientific manuscripts in international journals and periodicals. She is a vice-director of Contagious Improvement of Quality Assurance Unit—CIQAU at Faculty of Engineering, Ain Shams University — ASU. Her official e-mail is [e-mail]

Hisham M. G. Abusaada is currently professor of Architecture and urban design in architecture and housing research institute, Housing and Building National Research Center HBRC, Cairo, Egypt. He taught in the Urban Design program in the department of landscape architecture at King Faisal University, Saudi Arabia, from 1995 to 2004 and in several Egyptian Universities, and higher institutions. He is an architect and urban designer, educator, and author of numerous books and articles on the urban design. He has more than thirty-five issued scientific papers and sixtieth essays in Arabic and Egyptian magazine. He Concerns with the socio-cultural aspects and special problems of the urban community and development project. He has several published books i.e. (1) The Art of the City, Refutation of Intellectual Discourse toward knowledge Enlightenment, Partridge Publishing Africa, A penguin Random House Company, South Africa, 2015. (2) Topics in Landscape Architecture profession, Academic Book, Cairo, Egypt, 2007. (3) Post Occupancy Evaluation, Translated book, Faculty of Architecture and Planning, King Faisal University, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, 2004. (4) Efficiency and Urban Form Generation, approach to site planning and design, Academic Book, Cairo, Egypt, 1992.

The book cover, the freehand drawing is courtesy by the Architect; Tarek Afifi, MSc. represents one of unknown Egyptian sites.

PREFACE

T he Egyptian territory extends over an area of almost a thousand square kilometers. The inhabited areas constitute more than 7.8 percent of the total area. The area includes urban, rural, and wild areas, of which livable urban settlements are the most well-known. However, several other unknown places exist that have not been adequately explored by researchers. Many relatively unknown cities exist in Egypt that have not been explored by numerous researchers similar to traditionally famous cities. These remote cities should be included in future investigations since they could have features similar to those of dystopian ci ties .

The main issue in this book not only concerns ways to enhance the livability of urban areas but also explores ways to stop urban transformations that lead cities to become anti-utopian and to prevent them from becoming dystopias. Considering this, it may benefit some residents or migrant settlers to work or earn a living in the better-known cities. This process transforms the residents into anti-utopians. Thus, the central issue in this book concerns ways to enhance the potential of urban areas in both the little-known and well-known cities to become more convenient and comfortable places. The issue initially concerns ways to stop those developments in urbanization patterns in what are at present rural or informal areas (squatter settlements or Ashwa’iayht). This may help the residents of both known and unknown areas to realize that cities encourage their residents to be anti-utopian people, and this may prevent them from becoming dystopian cities or miserable environments.

This book explains some concepts that are prevalent in Western and Arabic thought concerning idealism or utopianism, including finding access to the notions of utopia. A transition has occurred in Western thought regarding dystopian cities, the concept of anti-utopian people, and identification of their essential characteristics. Therefore, this book links some of the features of anti-utopianism with ideas such as the loss of hope, the right to the city, livability, and lovability, thereby reaching to happiness. This study is also an investigation into the epistemology and methodologies of the urban design discipline. It seeks to understand ways of thinking that concern the meaning of unknown Egyptian cities in the status quo of the urban reality. The research method uses the descriptive analytical approach to understand the purpose of evaluating the viability of public criticism. The content analysis activates methods of self-criticism to restrain the features of the unknown cities and encourages the brighter prospects of urban design as art at the city level. On the one hand, what gets ignored in their towns and sites, in terms of inadequate support to the local cities in question, could turn some of the residents into anti-utopian people. On the other hand, increasing care for both known and unknown cities may move them toward brighter prospects regarding urban planning and design or with the help of the art of the city.

This work is structured as follows: the unknown Egyptian cities are studied, in which the loss of hope promotes anti-utopian thought. Unknown cities and places already exist in the Arab Republic of Egypt. Do the anti-utopians feel their lack of a right to the city? Once the provision of justice and the citizens’ rights to the city are achieved, people will raise their hopes and happiness. The city can achieve subjective well-being through the redesign and planning of the residential units. Can well-being and self-satisfaction be limited to just a single principle, such as pedestrian access within ten minutes to all essential services that can bring well-being? Should all measures be implemented in parallel or should issues faced by the unknown cities, such as the loss of hope and the right to the city/town, be addressed first?

This principle can guide the reformation of the necessary planning and design units to promote the right to the city, satisfaction, livability, lovability, and subjective well-being. However, restrictions remain on residents’ satisfaction, hope, and subjective well-being. These have been ignored by many researchers and specialists for many Egyptian cities and sites. Consequently, the question is how we can solve a problem that has not been fully recognized and that it is essential to accurately describe the present crisis as an interim target. Accordingly, the main ideas of this study are represented in the fact that the loss of hope is within wide limits to achieve anything. If the citizens’ loss of hope is ignored by officials and they fail to understand their problems, it exacerbates the loss of hope in evolving the unknown or forgotten cities.

From this perspective, the book adopts the following underlying hypothesis: The loss of hope for many citizens in their unknown cities converts them to anti-utopianism in purely laparoscopic vision. In reality, the practical application of this relative disregard for those residents, either in their unknown cities or the cities they migrate to, will convert them into destroyers. Not only do anti-utopian people struggle to achieve success, but they are also liable to become terrorists.

The objectives are as follows: first, to review the literature to obtain the guidelines for ten-minutes neighborhoods. Second, to perform a comparative content analysis of recent online articles regarding residents’ right to the city. Third, to test the resultant principles in Egyptian neighborhood settings. The idea of a ten-minute neighborhood is viable. The assumption concerns a flexible design. The logic of people who live within a ten-minute walk to perfect settings in their area can minimize several problems and maximize a healthy lifestyle. The supposed issue impacts the relation between a ten-minute neighborhood and citizens’ subjective well-being and. This assumption can be investigated through site observation and oriented questionnaire. This study recommends presenting new planning unit in a way that suits the current context of the old cities in the Middle East and North African region based on a ten-minute walk or less distance with reference to the right to the city. This planning unit can promote citizens’ subjective well-being.

Hence, this study discusses the necessity for publishing researchers’ results regarding the known cities across educational and scientific research forums without any appropriate response to the reality that comprises more than the remote towns. This will indicate the future prospects of utopian urbanism for today’s unknown cities.

This book represents an unadulterated, theoretical effort to support intellectual culture for those who are interested in and concerned about urban city-sites in the Egyptian community. Consequently, most of the texts in this book are based on a very broad base of published books, which would overwhelm the thread of the argument if they were sufficiently pointed out. Distinctly, this work points out the problems that are related to our problems. In any case, the perspective of this book revolves around the notion of beginning ‘from loss of hope to wellbeing [and] self- satisfaction.’

I

Hope as a Keyword

‘L oss of Hope’ is a logic meant to create scientific research. Dante Alighieri wrote in his book the Divine Comedy (1308-1321) on the stairs of the eternal palace of hell: Abandon hope, all ye who enter here (Alighieri 2014, 11). Also, when you read what Sébastien Roch Nicolas Chamfort (1902) comments on his words, in an unconventional means, hope is but a charlatan that ceases not to deceive us. For myself happiness only began when I had lost it. I would fain inscribe upon the gate of Paradise the line that Dante wrote upon that of Hell—‘Lasciate ognisperanza voi concentrate’ (Chamfort and Hutchison 2011, 28). Moreover, if you proceed to read what Saint Thomas (Aquinas) writes, fear does not remain in the heavenly homeland. Furthermore, every fear is about some evil, since evil is the object of fear… just as hope has some future good as its object, so fear has some future evil as its object. Moreover, he writes: Therefore, there will be no fear in the heavenly homeland. In another place, he writes, hope is more perfect than fear since hope looks to the good and fear looks to the evil. But, there will be no hope for the heavenly homeland. (Thomas, Christian and Bauerschmidt 2005, 148 -149)

Promptly, you will perceive that hope is an existing entity eternally, linked with our life on the Earth; that role will finish with the end of life, both for those who will go to paradise or who would abandon fate to the eternal destiny in hell. You have to adapt of your conviction that the problematic issue concerning hopelessness is widely allowed to create a coherent scientific research, in particular whether the attention of this research and its results affect the human being.

Hope is the magical word that participates to convince us that there is always a better future waiting. All specialists in all areas of humanity have relied on hope to overcome difficulties, always to see the best. Since the beginning of life, before monotheistic religions, atheists, pagans, and believers in God all use hope as a sign of an existing entity. In most faiths, ‘the doctrine of salvation’ is achieving dreams and hopes. Hope is for ‘salvation’ and ‘compensation.’ Hope for us may be considered as a collection between the meaning of a Divine Gift, a waking dream, a reasonable probability, an unconscious urge, a pure consciousness, a positive cognition, a binding force of community, and a source for healthy cooperative relationships. Moreover, it is considered as an entity to destroy the powers of human beings and an exceptional human faculty to comprehend the future, distinguishing between genuine and fraudulent hope. Further, it is an ontological need.

‘Critical Hope’ can be an orient towards the future, an antidote and panacea for suffering, a palliative which contributes to healing, and an openness to the future. In our natural life, hope leads to happiness by imagining a better tomorrow. The central purpose of this chapter is to explore if it is possible that deserving the idea of hope can be used as the main keyword for scientific research to achieve a better life in our unknown cities.

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are the greatest Abrahamic religions. Adam Dodds (2009) writes, ‘Abrahamic faiths’ or ‘religions of Abraham’ is a popular designation for Judaism, Christianity. Islam, emphasizes on their common heritage (Dodds 2001, 330). The three religions take the idea of ‘the doctrine of salvation’ to achieve dreams and hopes for the future of humanity. The word ‘salvation’ or the phrase ‘being saved’ is referred to salvation from the ultimate negativity. Where, salvation’ communicates the thought of deliverance, safety, preservation, soundness, restoration, and healing (James T. Murphy 2012, 29). Based on the notion of James T. Murphy, Jr. about daring hope to believe its salvation message. He believes that [H]ope provides the courage to face the chaotic, traumatic, perils, and that life often issue (James T. Murphy 2012, 103). ‘Hope’ indicates the idea of that yet to be received, and the ultimate salvation will be received in the last time (1 Peter 1:5), and the hope for salvation yet to come (1 Thessalonians 5:8). Edward Kessler in his book Jews, Christians and Muslims in Encounter Abraham is often regarded as a symbol of hope in the Jewish-Christian-Muslim encounter and acclaimed mentor and guide (Kessler 2013, 218).

Notably, hope exists in these three monotheistic religions in different forms, but in the same way;—searching for a better future life. In Judaism, Jonathan Sacks writes, [t]he Jewish festivals are all stories of hope (Tirosh-Samuelson and Hughes 2013, 98). Moreover, the entire legislative structure of Judaism is concentrated in creating a culture of hope (Tirosh-Samuelson and Hughes 2013, 99). In the other religions, Christianity is not a religion of hope, but it is the religion of confident expectation. Hope in Christianity depends on the course of events; confident expectation depends on God’s promise.

In the poetic and prophetic book hope is a fundamental component of the life of the righteous (Proverbs 23:18; 24:14), Without hope, life loses its meaning (Lam3:18; Job 7:6), in death there is no hope (Isa 38:18; Job 17:15), as well, hope is an enduring virtue of the Christian life (1 Cor.13: 13) (Freedman and Myers 2000, 605). In the context, in Christianity, Faith-hope-love is a person, Jesus Christ (Walsh and Yeomans 1968, 252). Along with faith and love, hope is an enduring virtue of the Christian life (1 Corinthians 13:13). Hope is to act in love now according to the full dimensions of Easter faith (Walsh and Yeomans 1968, 258). In fact, [t]he three theological virtues, faith, hope and charity, are bracketed together in the New Testament itself (Walsh and Yeomans 1968, 270). In the Bible, the Book of Proverbs, in the Old Testament, the hope of the righteous shall be gladness, but the exception of the wicked shall perish (Proverb: 10-28). When a wicked man death, his expecting shall perish; and the hope of unjust men perisheth. (Proverb: 11-7)

In Islam, hope has two faces one blameworthy, and the other