FRANO P. ZOVKO, LUCIJA MRZLJAK & BLOK: NEIGHBOUR TO NEIGHBOUR IS AN ARRANT WOLF

NEIGHBOUR TO NEIGHBOUR IS AN ARRANT WOLF - INDIVIDUALIZATION OF COLLECTIVE HOUSING

wall newspaper
September 2017


The privatization of the housing fund in the 90s, the influence of the private market into housing and the accompanying construction boom in the 2000s marked the spatial, social and economic processes of the post-socialist city on the European periphery. However, in the recent few years new factors have begun to model a debate on city, housing and housing architecture. On the one hand, the economic crisis slowed down the construction of new housing capacities and shifted the focus to a more rational use of the existing ones, while the reduction of housing expenses became a topic of increasing social importance. On the other hand, accession to the European Union imposes new standards governing the construction industry, energetics and impact on the environment.

As a consequence of these processes, a trend of retroactive adaptation of the existing buildings to new standards occurs by introducing systems for measuring, controlling and reducing energy consumption - the so-called retrofitting. The stated goals of these measures are most commonly to achieve a higher level of energetic efficiency and a fairer allocation of housing costs, while the incorporation of new technologies is presented as a scenario where everyone wins – ranging from tenants and (co)owners, through the construction industry and national economy to the entire ecosystem of the planet. However, a more careful insight into the situation on the ground shows that this is a process marked by numerous problems. It becomes clear that a fairer distribution of costs actually involves abandoning the principles of solidarity and individualization of resource consumption. Instead of collectiveness, the application of new regulations thus often results in divisions between tenants and an intensified polarization to the richer and poorer quarters.

Three issues of wall newspaper address the current trends in the area of energy consumption trying to re-examine the ideological matrix and social range of the neoliberal reflection on sustainable city. Trešnjevka, as our immediate neighborhood, represents an ideal terrain for distribution. However, since these problems concern the entire city, the newspaper can be downloaded as a PDF here and spread further (in Croatian only).


research: Frano Petar Zovko
illustrations: Lucija Mrzljak
concept and redaction: BLOK (Vesna Vuković, Ana Kutleša and Ivana Hanaček)