Architecture and its Role in Nation Building: A Critical Review

Brief introduction on architecture and how its spaces are perceived

The universal definition of architecture as a synthesis of ‘art’ and ‘science’ is inadequate in the present democratic, globalized, and information world of the 21st century. Many modern good-looking buildings with sound structures have been failed to meet the socio-cultural and psychological needs of the occupants. Hence, architecture must focus on people's needs and fulfill their aspirations.

We walk across various interesting buildings and structures every day. Here I am talking about the glass and concrete structures in which we spent a huge chunk of our time as well as money.

The structures in out built environment are in a different category altogether. Architecture is an art form that easily integrates itself into every aspect of our life. The valuable architectural contributions to society greatly impact how we and even other countries view or ideals and values as a nation. Buildings are a way of bringing people together.

Architecture is not limited to the layout of interior spaces of buildings but it has also a public face and community dimension. In addition to serving to clients, architects should also fulfill the social obligation and ‘nation building’. Finally, architecture is an indication of democracy.

Architecture through environmental design can make any individual, family, community, and society the realization of it. The coexistence of pluralistic cultures respecting each other’s identity, dignity, freedom, and public participation in the decision-making process are the basic norms of democracy in any form anywhere.

How architects affect our built environment

Architecture is not a design of a detached object but a part of the whole. Architects do not have an autonomous position in relation to the surrounding world but must work in constant dialogue with the users and makers of buildings.

Architects should be familiar with the notions of boundary, memory, and mapping, or public and private domains, as common things for an architectural intervention albeit landscape or urban.

As the built environment is a part of our everyday life, architects need to create architectural concepts that bode well with nature and solidify their relationship with humanity. As a complex relationship exists between buildings' form, function, and social context, architecture instead of going into the luxury of whim or aestheticism should respond to culture, context, and time including linking nature and humankind, inner and outer realities, and function and its meaning.

Relation of sustainability, globalisation, and architecture

Architecture should fit in the surrounding environment and local context. The authenticity of architecture provides a ground of individual identity. However, contemporary buildings with variations in size, shape, height, bulk, setbacks, and plinth levels from the adjacent structures together with the use of different materials and construction techniques are not only difficult to relate with the surrounding existing structures but they have also destroyed the sense of enclosure, the singular composition of continuous streets walls, volumetric definition and unity in the street scene.

Nature is seen as the place where the true self of the modern man can find expression, removed from the exigencies of caste, gender, space, and time.

Buildings are not inanimate objects but help in human context and make buildings/structure a living part of our world. The aim of architecture is to address global challenges with the need to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and more sustainable.

The role of architecture in nation building

However, the focus should not only be on urbanization and migration but more on things like land use, mass housing, living space, and design that is sustainable. Architecture is a conservative art in the sense that it materializes and preserves the history of culture. As contemporary buildings have failed to continue the architectural culture and to respond to the community spaces, architecture has become fragmented into detached and isolated works.

Society is detached from traditional sources and identity due to losses of the community’s existential experience through the mosaic of placeless and timeless information. The spectrum of today’s architecture is confined to the narrow range of the visual aesthetic experience and it lacks melancholic and tragic as well as ecstatic polarities. As the ground of truth is lost, aesthetics take over and everything turns into pure aesthetics, technology, economics, and politics.

The essence of architecture focusing on ‘human’ component and the scope of architecture beyond building structure shall be well established in architecture schools as well as private practice. Architects should play a crucial role in infrastructure planning and construction.

How architecture played an important role in nation-building: an example of India

Architectural ideology during independence and how it got physically manifested

After independence, major migration took place and hence there was less money. Jawaharlal Nehru wanted to show the power of the nation by its structures. At that time there were two ideologies of architects:

1. One from JJ (under Batley) - Hindu Revival architecture (Indo-Sarcenic architecture)
2. By BV Doshi, Le Corbusier, Habib Rehman – Modern architecture

The government asked for trained architects but their working conditions were very different. To main buildings of this era were: Ashoka Hotel (1952) by EB Doctor and CSIR (1953) by AP Kanvinde

The Ashoka Hotel had a broad appeal amongst intellectuals and was also supported by senior bureaucrats and politicians as it was a Hindu Revivalist building and hence was understood more by the people rather than the modern buildings. The modernist architecture in Delhi at that time was Utilitarian modernism (international style with local materials).

Nehru was disturbed by the developments along Central Vista. So he invited Habib Rehman to Delhi, where he began his long career in government with PWD. After becoming the prime minister in 1947, Nehru embarked on a massive building spree in Delhi in order to construct the infrastructure necessary for governing the nation, housing new government employees who were flocking to the capital. Nehru invited architects from everywhere for planning of cities as well as important buildings.

The formation of the Architects Act which regulated the profession, education and training of architects and town planners in India also helped in providing stability to architects all across the country.

Further, architects constructed structures that were more towards social harmony and growth of India and saved its culture and identity.

Institutionalisation of architecture in India

Colonialism was there at that time. The first school of architecture was JJ School in Bombay. The buildings at that time were built mostly by British engineers and lacked creativity. The only Indians were draftsmen. There were only two architectural schools at that time and art history as a subject was only started in the late 1970s. JJ School of Art was also established by colonial India. In 1913, the Department of Architecture was formed.

By 1947, only three schools of architecture were present. India’s first five-year plan was made in 1952- which had heavy industries, townships, industrial housing, and scientific and technical research and training. All of this led to urban growth and a unique identity of India as a nation.

Conclusion

Architecture helps in structuring a nation’s identity using buildings and structures. It also leads to social harmony and economic growth; saves a nation’s culture and makes it unique and innovative.

An architect is a designer of a society’s built environment who provides shelter, welfare, stability, safety, and efficiency towards the people as well as the nation. Good architecture leads the nation towards a better future.