Democracy in Retreat? Master Planning in a Warming World

The climate crisis is changing the world. Some people are moving in the face of rising seas and extreme weather, and others are redesigning the places they live. But those making such plans and those most affected by them are not always the same. The challenges posed by climate change thus force architects, planners, engineers, and others charged with imagining the future of their communities to contend with enduring questions of democracy and justice.

This conference foregrounds Louisiana’s experience with these challenges, because on the Gulf Coast, the climate has changed. New designs and infrastructures have reshaped how Louisianans live, just as evacuation, eviction, and emigration in the face of rising seas have redefined where they live. All the while, as the United States confronts climate change it is already riven by stark inequalities. Escaping critical interrogation, technocratic plans promulgated in the name of “resilience” can not only reproduce, but exacerbate existing injustices across the country and beyond its borders. Many policies that promise security for some cause suffering for others. But must there be winners and losers in the pursuit of safety, justice, and democracy?

This event brings together architects, planners, scholars, artists, and others whose work engages with the challenges of planning for climate change. Using Louisiana as the case to “think with,” participants will work comparatively to evaluate the perils and promises of risk and retreat, given the imperatives of justice and democracy.

View the full schedule here.

Organized by:
Fallon Samuels Aidoo, Jean Brainard Boebel Chair in Historic Preservation, Assistant Professor of Planning & Urban Studies, University of New Orleans
Andy Horowitz, Assistant Professor, Department of History, School of Liberal Arts, Tulane University
Carol McMichael Reese, Director of the City, Culture, and Community Ph.D. Program; Professor of Architecture, Tulane University
The Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture, Columbia University

Sponsored by:
University of New Orleans: Center for Hazards Assessment, Response and Technology, Department of Planning and Urban Studies
Mary D. Coghill Charter School
Tulane University: School of Architecture, ByWater Institute, New Orleans Center for the Gulf South, Stone Center for Latin American Studies, Mellon Program in Community-Engaged Scholarship
Columbia University: Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture

Image: Jocelyn Augustino, FEMA