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2020 | OriginalPaper | Buchkapitel

2. The Lefebvrian Lexicon

verfasst von : Francesco Biagi

Erschienen in: Henri Lefebvre's Critical Theory of Space

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Abstract

In this chapter, I aim to show that Lefebvre is a leading theorist of the late twentieth century: he provides a unique perspective for assessing crucial urban problems of the early twenty-first century. Despite his importance, Lefebvre’s thought is not well known, and his contribution remains undervalued. We are currently living in a “dark time” for cities: they find themselves between economic crisis and speculative dynamics, both of which consistently violate the rights of their inhabitants. Therefore, I present the idea of how fundamental it is to reread Lefebvre’s urban studies starting with his earliest rural studies. My work intends to demonstrate how urban studies are a necessity that emerges after the social inquiries that were conducted from the rural studies: the radical changes in nature and in the peasant world operated by capitalism will lead Lefebvre to the epochal problem of the urban question.

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Vorheriges Kapitel A Critical Reflection Beyond the Academic Disciplines

Nächstes Kapitel Philosophy and Sociology of Space

In the Anglophone debate the only exception is Elden (see Understanding Henri Lefebvre: Theory and Possible, Continuum, London, 2004, pp. 127–168) and the journal Antipode (S. Elden, A. D. Morton, “Thinking Past Henri Lefebvre: Introducing The Theory of Ground Rent and Rural Sociology”, in Antipode. A Radical Journal of Geography, Volume 48, n. 1, January 2016, pp. 57–66). The only study in Italy that refers relevantly Lefebvre’s inquiries on the rural world belongs to Simona De Simoni in her PHD dissertation (see: Id., Filosofia politica dello spazio: Il programma di ricerca di Henri Lefebvre e le sue conseguenze teoriche, PHD Thesis, University of Torino and Université Paris Ouest-Nanterre La Défense, 11 aprile 2016, pp. 20–26).

See the introduction and the opening foreword to these studies: S. Elden, A. D. Morton, “Thinking Past Henri Lefebvre: Introducing The Theory of Ground Rent and Rural Sociology”, pp. 57–66.

Regarding Lefebvre’s relation with his birth region, see: P. Ganas, Henri Lefebvre. Philosophe mondialement connu, Pyrénéen ignoré, Cercle Historique de l’Arribère, Navarrenx, 2005. Besides, Remi Hess recalls that Lefebvre declares he had misplaced a rural sociology research manuscript entitled Traité de sociologie rurale. On this event, see: Id., Henri Lefebvre et l’aventure du siècle, métailié, Paris, 1991, p. 169.

Ł. Stanek, Henri Lefebvre on Space: Architecture, Urban Research and the Production of Theory, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2011, p. 5.

See: H. Lefebvre, Les communautés paysannes pyrénéennes (origine, développement, déclin). Étude de sociologie historique, PHD dissertation defended at the Université de Paris-Sorbonne. Une république pastorale: La vallée du Campan: Organisation, vie et histoire d’une communauté pyrénéenne: Texte et documents accompagnés de commentaires et d’une Étude de sociologie historique, PHD dissertation, vol. I e II, Université de Paris - Sorbonne 1954. This PHD thesis will afterwards be re-structured and published, see: H. Lefebvre, La vallée de Campan: Étude de sociologie rurale, PUF, Paris, 1963. And, finally, the illustrated guide organized by Lefebvre: Id., Pyrénées, Cairn, Paris, 2000 (1965).

Trebitsch points out how Lefebvre, at the CES, surrounds himself with the most prominent theoreticians of rural sociology studies; see the English preface to the second volume of Everyday life critique: M. Trebitsch, “The Moment of the Radical Critique (Preface)”, in H. Lefebvre, Critique of Everyday Life. Vol. II, Verso, London, 2002, pp. IX–XXV.

Mario Gaviria (1938) is a Spanish sociologist who graduated Paris with Henri Lefebvre. He taught at the University of Zaragoza and Navarra. He introduced to the Spanish Academy the rural and urban sociology by translating Lefebvre’s works. Online you can find one of the latest video interviews by Stanek to Gaviria on Lefebvre’s intellectual production entitled “Henri Lefebvre: Toward an Architecture of Enjoyment” (February 2, 2013, online).

H. Lefebvre, “Problèmes de sociologie rurale. La communauté paysanne et ses problems”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, Anthropos, Paris, 2001, p. 37.

Ibidem, p. 25. Id., The Urban Revolution, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2003, p. 6.

H. Lefebvre, “Problèmes de sociologie rurale. La communauté paysanne et ses problems”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, Anthropos, Paris, 2001, pp. 29–30. However, later on, the author asserts his full acceptance of Durkheim but he doesn’t recognize the “obligation-sanction” device that determines organic solidarity, preferring instead to define that social relation under the form of discipline since it pertains to the natural unfolding of events that are not collective obligations (Ibidem, p. 33).

Ibidem, p. 38.

Ibidem, p. 34.

Ibidem, p. 40.

Ibidem, pp. 35–36.

I translate as “sharecrop farmer” what Lefebvre means by the poor peasant who hasn’t land, and as “tenant farmer” the farmer who takes advantage of the land’s lease and becomes a “large capitalist farmer” in the Fordist context. Lefebvre highlights this particular exploitative nature of the tenant towards the sharecrop farmer, with reference to the old landowner who has an agrarian property of feudal origin [author’s footnote].

See: H. Lefebvre, “Les classes sociales dans les campagnes. La Toscane et la mezzadria classica”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, pp. 41–45.

Ibidem, p. 45.

H. Lefebvre, “Perspectives de la sociologie rurale”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, p. 63.

See: H. Lefebvre, “Introduction”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, pp. 18–19.

See: H. Lefebvre, “Toward a Leftist Cultural Politics: Remarks Occasioned by Centenary of Marx’s Death”, in C. Nelson, L. Grossberg (edited by), Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture, Mcmillan, London, 1988, p. 77.

H. Lefebvre, “Perspectives de la sociologie rurale”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, p. 69.

See: Ibidem, p. 64.

See: E. Bloch, “Differenzierungen im Begriff Fortschritt”, in Tübinger Einleitung in die Philosophie, Werkausgabe Band 13, Suhrkamp, Frankfurt, 1970, pp. 118–146; Id., Heritage of Our Times, Polity Press, Cambridge, 1991.

As way of example see the Research Center of “Proyecto Andino de Tecnologías Campesinas – PRATEC” in Peru. See: Proyecto de Tecnologías Campesinas, Tecnologías Campesinas de los Andes. Primer Seminario Internacional de Rescate y Sistematización de Tecnologías Campesinas Andinas, Horizonte, Lima, 1988. S. Pérez-Vitoria, E. Sevilla Guzman (edited by), “Dossier: l'agroécologie, la résistance des paysans”, in L'Ecologiste, n. 14, 2004. S. Pérez-Vitoria, Les paysans sont de retour, Actes Sud, Arles, 2005. Id., La riposte des paysans, Actes Sud, Arles, 2010. Id., Manifeste pour un XXI^e siècle paysan, Actes Sud, Arles, 2015. E. Sevilla Guzman, Introducción a la Agroecología como desarrollo rural sostenible, Icaria Editorial, Barcelona, 2006. Id., De la sociología rural a la agroecología, Icaria Editorial, Barcelona, 2006. Id., Sobre los orígenes de la agroecología en el pensamiento marxista y libertario, Agruco-plural-CDE-NCCR, La Paz, 2011. E. Sevilla Guzman, G. Woodgate, “Agroecology: Foundations in Agrarian Social Thought and Sociological Theory”, in Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems, Volume 37, n. 1, 2013, pp. 32–44.

H. Lefebvre, “Perspectives de la sociologie rurale”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, pp. 73–74.

I highlight that in English there is an excellent translation of this Lefebvre’s article by Matthew Dennis (and edited by Stuart Elden and Adam David Morton) published in a issue of “Antipode” journal (H. Lefebvre, “The Theory of Ground Rent and Rural Sociology”, translated by Matthew Dennis and edited by Stuart Elden and Adam David Morton, in Antipode, Volume 48, n. 1, 2016, pp. 67–73), but I quoted the original version.

Ibidem, p. 79.

See also: H. Lefebvre, “Capital and Land Ownership”, in Marxist Thought and the City, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2016, pp. 134–143.

V. I. Lenin, “Capitalism in Agriculture” (1899), in Lenin Collected Works, Vol. 4, Progress Publishers, Moscow, 1960. Id., “The Agrarian Question and the Critics of Marx” (1901), in Lenin Collected Works, Vol. 5. Id., “The Development of Capitalism in Russia” (1896–1899), in Lenin Collected Works, Vol. 3. Id., “New Data on the Laws Governing the Development of Capitalism in Agriculture” (1915), in Lenin Collected Works, Vol. 22.

See: K. Marx, “Capital” (1894), in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. 37, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1998, pp. 608–800, book III chapters 37–47.

H. Lefebvre, “Théorie de la rente foncière et sociologie rurale”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, pp. 82–84.

K. Marx, “Capital” (1894), in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. 37, pp. 734–758, book III chapter 45.

H. Lefebvre, “Théorie de la rente foncière et sociologie rurale”, in Du Rural à l’Urbain, p. 84.

Ibidem, p. 85.

See specifically the third and fifth chapter of Mike Davis’ The Planet of Slums, Verso, London, 2005. From another perspective and with different literature, see: S. De Simoni, Filosofia politica dello spazio: il programma di ricerca di Henri Lefebvre e le sue conseguenze teoriche, p. 26.

See: A. Acosta, “Extractivism and Neo-extractism: Two Sides of the Same Curse”, in M. Lang and D. Mokrani (edited by), Beyond Development Alternative Visions from Latin America, Transnational Institute - Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Amsterdam, 2013, pp. 61–87. P. Dàvalos, “No podemos ser mendigos sentados en un saco de oro: las falacias del discurso extractivista”, in El correismo desnudo, Montecristi Vive Editor, Quito, 2013. H. Burchardt, K. Dietz, “(Neo)-extractivism: A New Challenge for Development Theory from Latin America”, in Third World Quarterly, Volume 24, n. 3, 2014, pp. 468–86. H. Veltmeyer, J. Petras (edited by), The New Extractivism: A Post-neoliberal Development Model or Imperialism of the Twenty-First Century?, Zed Books, London, 2014. N. Fabricant, B. Gustafson, “Moving Beyond the Extractivism Debate, Imagining New Social Economies”, in NACLA Report on the Americas, Volume 47, n. 4, 2015, pp. 40–45. E. Lopez, F. Vertiz, “Extractivism, Transnational Capital and Subaltern Struggles in Latin America”, Latin American Perspectives, Vol. 42, n. 204, 2015, pp. 152–68. V. Gago, S. Mezzadra, “A Critique of the Extractive Operations of Capital: Toward an Expanded Concept of Extractivism”, in Rethinking Marxism, Volume 29, n. 4, 2017, pp. 574–91. S. Mezzadra, B. Neilson, “On the Multiple Frontiers of Extraction: Excavating Contemporary Capitalism”, in Cultural Studies, Volume 31, n. 2–3, 2017, pp. 185–204.

I refer to the derogatory term that was used to refer to the Algerian resistance militants against French colonialism; See: S. Bromberger, Les rebelles algériens, Plon, Paris, 1958. See also: M. Rigouste, L’ennemi intérieur. La généalogie coloniale et militaire de l'ordre sécuritaire dans la France contemporaine, La Découverte, Paris, 2009. Therefore, see Monique Hervo’s research on the interchange of relations between the Nanterre slum and the Algerian War: Id., Nanterre en Guerre d'Algérie: Chroniques du bidonville 1959–1962, Seuil, Paris, 2001.

I share this interpretation with De Simoni but my approach to the author is somehow different: I do not effectively share the more general insertion of Lefebvre in the Post-Fordist and Post-Workerism debate (see: Id., Filosofia politica dello spazio: Il programma di ricerca di Henri Lefebvre e le sue conseguenze teoriche, pp. 91–94; Id., “Le droit à la ville. Note (d)ai margini”, in Euronomade, 3/05/2015).

See: L. Costes, Lire Henri Lefebvre. Le droit à la ville. Vers la sociologie de l’urbain, Ellipses, Paris, 2009, p. 42.

In Italy, similar researches on the peripheries were undertaken by Danilo Montaldi, see: Id., Milano Corea. Inchiesta sugli immigrati, Donzelli, Roma, 2010. Montaldi had engaged a strong bind with the members of Socialisme ou Barbarie. We may hypothesize that Lefebvre and Montaldi, despite the lack of evidence on them knowing each other, actually reached a mutual debate.

M. Hervo, M. A. Charras, Bindovilles, l’enlisement, Maspero, Paris, 1971; see also Y. Gastaut, “Les bidonvilles, lieux d’exclusion et de marginalité en France durant les trente glorieuses”, in Cahiers de la Méditerranée, n. 69, 2004; A. Sayad (avec É. Dupuy), Un Nanterre algérien, terre de bindovilles, Éditions Autrement, Paris, 1995.

See: E. De Martino, La fine del mondo, Einaudi, Torino, 2002. For a re-elaboration of De Martino’s categories within the current context also see: M. Pezzella, La memoria del possibile, Jaca Book, Milano, 2009, pp. 239–271.

E. De Martino, La fine del mondo, p. 203.

A. Sayad, La double absence. Des illusions de l'émigré aux souffrances de l'immigré, Seul, Paris, 1999.

The film shocked France at the Cannes Festival in 2010 opening a strong debate to the point that the film was labeled as anti-French for having mentioned historical events of the colonialist era that had been willingly excluded from the transalpine collective conscience. A real resentment against the film director took place for having conducted such a backward journey into the colonial past, especially for having evoked tortures and massacres carried out in the motherland and in the colonies.

H. Lefebvre, “Le bourgeoisie et l’espace”, in Espace et politique. Le droit à la ville II, p. 143.

The debate is much too wide however it suffices to think of the form-camp studies by Giorgio Agamben and Michel Agier.

H. Lefebvre, The Critique of Everyday Life. Volume I, London, Verso, 2008, pp. 245–246.

L. Wacquant, Urban Outcasts. A Comparative Sociology of Advanced Marginality, Polity Press, Cambridge, 2007.

A. Petrillo, La periferia nuova. Disuguaglianza, spazi, città, Franco Angeli, Milano, 2018. I debated many of the reflections expressed in this paragraph with Agostino Petrillo at the conference “The Right to the City” that was held in Rome, on the 24–25 November 2016, at the Faculty of Architecture (Sapienza University) organized by the “Fondazione per la Critica Sociale” and by the journal “Il Ponte”.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, Wiley-Blackwell, London, 1996, p. 100.

H. Lefebvre, La proclamation de la Commune, Gallimard, Paris, 1965, p. 31.

H. Lefebvre, “A propos de la recherche interdisciplinaire en sociologie urbaine et en urbanisme”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 269.

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2003, p. 14.

H. Lefebvre, “La vie sociale dans la ville”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 159.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 107–112.

H. Lefebvre, “La vie sociale dans la ville”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 160.

Ibidem.

Ibidem, pp. 160–161.

Ibidem, p. 161.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 113.

Ibidem, p. 115.

See: Ibidem, p. 107.

Ibidem., pp. 65–66, 68–70.

H. Lefebvre, “La vie sociale dans la ville”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 161. It should be recalled how the concept of “technique” directs to the various studies on this same concept conducted by Heidegger, by the Frankfurt School, by the Situationists, etc. The author, as he uses this term is fully aware of the debate around the connections between the idea of “technique” and the expansion of capitalism, despite the fact that he avoids placing quotes and footnotes in his texts.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 69.

See: S. Settis, Perché Venezia muore, Einaudi, Torino, 2014.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 70.

H. Lefebvre, “Intervention au séminaire de sociologie de Madrid”, in Du rural à l’urbain., pp. 258–259.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 17; Id., The Urban Revolution, p. 5.

Ibidem, p. 68.

See: L. Wirth, Urbanism as a Way of Life, Chicago University Press, Chicago, 1964.

Lewis Mumford also considers the analysis of the city of Coketown as imagined by Dickens in Hard Times. See: L. Mumford, The City in History, MJF Books, New York, 1997 (1961).

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, pp. 184–185.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 130–131.

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, pp. 139, 162–164.

Ibidem, p. 123. See as well the polemic with young Manuel Castells and the Althusserian structuralism.

See: H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 14.

M. Tomba, Strati di tempo. Karl Marx materialista storico, Jaca Book, Milano, 2011, p. 9.

N. Brenner (edited by), Implosions/Explosions: Towards a Study of Planetary Urbanization, Ed. Jovis, Berlin, 2014.

See: H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 74.

See: Ibidem, p. 79.

See: Ibidem, p. 81. In The Urban Revolution he also delineates the three periods, however using different terminology. See: Id., The Urban Revolution, pp. 28–44.

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 175.

See: H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 67–68.

See: Ibidem, p. 84.

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 14.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 71.

Ibidem, p. 71–72.

H. Lefebvre, “Capital and Land Ownership”, in Marxist Thought and the City, p. 121.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 67.

Ibidem, p. 142.

Ibidem, p. 81.

Ibidem, p. 161.

I refer to Niccolò Cuppini and Simona De Simoni recensions to the Italian re-print of the Right to the City: N. Cuppini, “Il diritto alla città un capitolo mancante ancora da scrivere?”, in infoaut, 4/03/2015 (online). S. De Simoni, “Le droit à la ville. Note (d)ai margini”. For the debate on global cities see: J. Borja, M. Castells, Local and Global: The Management of Cities in the Information Age, Routledge, London, 1997. S. Sassen, The Global City: New York, London, Tokyo, Princeton University Press, Princeton, 1991. Id., “Introduire le concept de ville globale”, in Raisons Politiques, Volume 15, n. 3, 2004, pp. 9–23. Id., Expulsions: Brutality and Complexity in the Global Economy, Belknap Press, Cambridge (MA), 2014. Id., “The Global City: Enabling Economic Intermediation and Bearing Its Costs”, in City & Community, Volume 15, n. 2, 2016, pp. 97–108.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 158–159.

See: S. Sassen, “Global Cities and Survival Circuits”, in B. Ehrenreich, A. Russell Hochschild (edited by), Global Woman: Nannies, Maids, and Sex Workers in the New Economy, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2002, pp. 254–274.

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 115.

Ibidem, p. 148.

100

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 21.

101

See: M. Augé, Non-places: An Introduction to Anthropology of Supermodernity, Verso, London, 1995 (1992).

102

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 124–125.

103

H. Lefebvre, “Besoins profonds, besoins nouveaux de la civilisation urbaine”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 204–205. See also: Id., “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 118–121.

104

H. Lefebvre, The Critique of Everyday Life. Volume I, p. 230.

105

See: H. Lefebvre, Conférence à la cite universitaire d’Antony, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 231.

106

See: H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 71.

107

Ibidem, p. 126.

108

See: H. Lefebvre, “Besoins profonds, besoins nouveaux de la civilisation urbaine”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 205.

109

See: H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 15; Id., “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 123.

110

See: H. Lefebvre, “The City and the Division of Labour”, in Marxist Thought and the City, p. 29.

111

See: Ibidem, pp. 31–32.

112

See: Ibidem, pp. 37–38. Here we are obviously referring to the passage from commercial-feudal city to industrial city in which the conflict city-countryside is more than ever strong. Lefebvre, will next innovate that urban-rural dialectic, explaining how the agricultural world is also industrialized and partakes in that “intellectual work” understood as technical and instrumental reason applied to the maximization of productive forces to the subsequent maximization of profits (See: H. Lefebvre, “Capital and Land Ownership”, in Marxist Thought and the City, p. 120).

113

See: K. Marx, F. Engels, “The German Ideology” (1846), in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. 5, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1976, pp. 32–36, 64–65.

114

H. Lefebvre, “Critique of Political Economy”, in Marxist Thought and the City, p. 60.

115

K. Marx, F. Engels, “The Communist Manifesto” (1848), in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. 6, p. 488.

116

F. Engels, “The Peasant Question in France and Germany” (1894), in Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels Collected Works, Vol. 27, p. 486.

117

See: H. Lefebvre, “The Situation of the Working Class in England”, in Marxist Thought and the City, pp. 3–18.

118

Ibidem, p. 7.

119

F. Engels, “The Condition of the Working Class in England” (1845), in Collected Works of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Volume 4, p. 329.

120

Ibidem.

121

Ibidem, p. 330.

122

H. Lefebvre, “The Situation of the Working Class in England”, in Marxist Thought and the City, p. 18.

123

Ibidem, p. 11. See: F. Engels, “The Condition of the Working Class in England” (1845), in Collected Works of Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Volume 4, p. 349.

124

Ibidem.

125

Ibidem, p. 355.

126

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 81.

127

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 82.

128

Ibidem, p. 76.

129

M. Heidegger, “Building Dwelling Thinking”, in Poetry, Language, Thought, Harper Colophon Books, New York, 1971, p. 149.

130

See: Ibidem, pp. 148–150.

131

Ibidem, p. 147.

132

Ibidem, p. 161.

133

On the “technique” issue see also: M. Heidegger, “The Question Concerning Technology”, in The Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, Harper and Row, New York, 1977, pp. 3–35. This topic is resumed and developed also in Ernesto de Martino’s writings (La fine del mondo). See also: M. Pezzella, La memoria del possibile, pp. 69–102.

134

M. Heidegger, Being and Time, SUNY Press, Albany (New York), 1996.

135

It should be underlined something that Lefebvre couldn’t have known clearly that in Black Notebooks Heidegger accuses the Jews of being a people that is unable to “dwell” and, for this, condemned to exile. However, such exile—as Heidegger argues—is a disaster to Germany and to Europe (the critique has often talked of “metaphysical anti-Semitism”). Despite Heidegger’s being a great philosopher, his critique of technique doesn’t adequately understand the capitalist way of production and remains, actually, exclusively a critique of modern life. The critique on technique is not the same of the critique of Capital, that is, of the political economy of modernity. In secondary literature see: D. Di Cesare, Heidegger e gli ebrei. I quaderni neri, Bollati Boringhieri, Torino, 2016.

136

M. Heidegger, “…Poetically man dwells…”, in Poetry, Language, Thought, Harper Colophon Books, New York, 1971, p. 213.

137

Ibidem, p. 211.

138

G. Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, Beacon Press, Boston, 1994.

139

Bachelard expressively mentions «topophilia» . See: (Ibidem, pp. XXXV–XXXV).

140

M. Heidegger, “…Poetically man dwells…”, in Poetry, Language, Thought, p. 218.

141

In this regard, Lefebvre recalls as way of example the oriental housing practices that still haven’t forgotten the importance of the poetic and aesthetic element. See: H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 83.

142

G. Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, p. 5.

143

Ibidem, pp. 6–7.

144

Ibidem, p. 17.

145

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 82.

146

H. Lefebvre, “Les nouveaux ensembles urbains”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 111.

147

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 81.

148

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 77–78.

149

Le Corbusier, Costruire in serie, in Scritti, Einaudi, Torino, 2003, p. 87.

150

Ibidem, p. 90.

151

See: H. Lefebvre, “Introduction”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 13. See also: Id., “Notes on New Town”, in Introduction to Modernity, Verso, London, 1995 (1962), pp. 116–126.

152

H. Lefebvre, “Les nouveaux ensembles urbains”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 116.

153

See: H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 139.

154

H. Lefebvre, “Les nouveaux ensembles urbains”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 119–124.

155

Ibidem, pp. 125–128.

156

H. Raymond, N. Haumont, M. G. Dezes, A. Haumont, L’habitat pavillonaire, Harmattan, Paris, 2001 (1965).

157

The text that can be found in the volume regarding the survey was also inserted in: H. Lefebvre, “Introduction à l’etude de l’habitat pavillonnaire”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 159–182.

158

Ibidem, p. 161.

159

Ibidem, p. 162.

160

See: A. Girard, Désirs des français en matière d’habitation urbaine, “Travaux et Documentes”, I.N.E.D, n. 3, PUF, Paris, 1947; Id., Enquête sur la population des grands ensembles d’habitation collective, I.N.E.D, 1965.

161

In the last and fourth edition of the volume a further study dated back to 1999 confirming the previous inquiries and demonstrating how the myth of the single-family house isn’t challenged.

162

H. Lefebvre, “Introduction à l’etude de l’habitat pavillonnaire”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 179–180.

Ibidem, p. 165.

Ibidem, pp. 166–167.

Ibidem, pp. 172–175.

H. Lefebvre, “Besoins profonds, besoins nouveaux de la civilisation urbaine”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 200–201.

167

K. Marx, “Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844”, in Marx & Engels Collected Works, Vol. 3, pp. 293–305.

168

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, p. 144; Id., “Utopie expérimentale: pour un nouvel urbanisme”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 135–136.

169

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 78–80.

170

On Le Corbusier’s theoretical education see: P. V. Turner, The Education of Le Corbusier, Garland, New York, 1977.

171

See: B. Settis, Fordismi. Storia politica della produzione di massa, Il Mulino, Bologna, 2016, pp. 170–171.

172

Le Corbusier, Vers le Paris de l’époque machiniste, supplément to the Bulletin of the Redressement Français, 15 February 1928, 14 pp.; Id., Pour bâtir: standardiser et tayloriser, 1 May 1928, 8 pp. (quoted in: M. McLeod, “Architecture or Revolution: Taylorism, Technocracy and Social Change”, in Art Journal, Volume 43, n. 2, 1983, pp. 132–147). It is paramount to mention Le Corbusier’s partaking, from 1925 until 1935, at the anti-political movement Le Redressement Français founded by Marshall Ferdinand Foch and industrialist Ernest Mercier, electricity and oil tycoon (who owned the famous company Total) that diffused nationalist political ideas very close to the extreme-right, however the movement’s intentions were those of promoting a technocratic industrial modernization in France insisting on the connection between production and mass consumerism. For precision – notwithstanding the debate around Le Corbusier’s fascist sympathies it is fundamental to highlight the adhesion to technocratic ideology and the political tension in re-proposing man’s salvation and prosperity in the mass production and scientific organization of work and human life.

173

Le Corbusier, Après le Cubisme, Altamira, Paris, 1999 (1918).

174

Le Corbusier, “La leçon de la machine”, in L'Esprit Nouveau, n. 25, juillet 1924.

175

Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture, Architectural Press, Oxford, 2000 (1923), p. 289. See also: M. McLeod, “Architecture or Revolution: Taylorism, Tecnocracy and Social Change”.

176

Le Corbusier, The City of Tomorrow, MIT Press, Cambridge (MA), 1971 (1926), p. 301.

177

See: J. Lucan, “Généalogie du regard sur Paris”, in Paris Projet, n. 32–33, 1998 (online); Id., Le Corbusier: une encyclopédie, Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, 1987. To confirm this thesis see also: P. V. Aureli, “Il ritorno della fabbrica. Appunti su territorio, architettura, operai e capitale”, in Opera Viva Magazine, 31/12/2016 (online).

178

H. Lefebvre, “The Right to the City”, in Writings on Cities, pp. 74–76.

179

Le Corbusier, Precisions on the Present State of Architecture and City Planning, MIT Press, Cambridge (MA), 1991 (1930), pp. 49–51.

180

See: Le Corbusier, “Il padiglione dell’Esprit Nouveau”, in Scritti, pp. 155–164.

181

Le Corbusier, Precisions on the Present State of Architecture and City Planning, pp. 267–270.

182

Rosa Tamborrino brings this to mind in a footnote for the Einaudi anthology, see: Le Corbusier, “Il centro di Parigi”, in Scritti, p. 118.

183

Le Corbusier, “Costruire in serie”, in Scritti, p. 90.

184

See: Le Corbusier, The City of Tomorrow, MIT Press, Cambridge (MA), 1971 (1926), pp. 239–290.

185

Le Corbusier, Precisions on the Present State of Architecture and City Planning, p. 194.

Ibidem, p. 196.

Ibidem, pp. 198–199.

Ibidem, p. 201.

Le Corbusier, La ville radieuse: éléments d'une doctrine d'urbanisme pour l'équipement de la civilisation machiniste, Freal, Paris, 1964 (1935). I believe it is necessary to specify an issue regarding the debate on Le Corbusier sympathy toward fascism. As serious as it is I am nevertheless convinced that it is neither paramount to understand his degree of collaborationism with the Petain government, nor to measure his sympathy toward the eversive Right-wing. We’ll leave that task to historians. In fact it suffices to highlight his joining the modern project of the capitalist technique to understand the concrete harmfulness of Le Corbusier’s theoretical framework. In other words it is enough to understand his idea of city: functionalism is characterized by such mystical and mythical fascination towards the capitalist industrial technique and such a program can be declensionable in the authoritarian optics of totalitarism as well in the “democratic” optics of the liberal post second war democratic regimes.

190

Le Corbusier, “Méditation sur Ford” (later also in Quand les cathédrales étaient blanches, 1937), in M. Bill (edited by), Œuvre Complète, Volume 3, Éditions d’Architecture, Zürich, 1964, pp. 16–17. Besides, among many anecdotes I wish to recall that Le Corbusier was also mesmerized by the building of the “Lingotto” in Turin by the Agnelli family in the two trips he took before 1920 and later in 1934 (see: Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture).

191

“The house is a machine for living in” (Le Corbusier, Towards a New Architecture, p. 107). On what concerns further elaboration on Le Corbusier’s categorization of the house as “machine for living in”. See chapters III and VI in: Le Corbusier, Looking at city planning, Grossman Publishers, New York, 1971 (1946). And see also: Id., “L’abitazione, speranza della civiltà macchinista”, in Scritti, pp. 324–330.

192

Le Corbusier, “L’esprit nouveau en architecture” (1924), in Almanach d’une architecture moderne, Éditions Crès, Paris, 1925, p. 29.

193

H. Lefebvre, “Les nouveaux ensembles urbains”, in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 114.

194

H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, p. 18.

195

Ibidem. See also: Id., “Le Bistrot-Club”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 141–144.

196

H. Lefebvre, “La vie sociale dans la ville”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 150–152.

197

In order to refer to the Athens Charter we chose to quote the last edition available in Italian (Le Corbusier, La Carta di Atene. Manifesto e frammento dell’urbanistica moderna, edited by P. Di Biagi, Officina Edizioni, Roma, 1998), since it includes a rich repertoire of the versions that followed and were discussed in the preparatory documents, which is since 1931 (two years prior to the C.I.A.M IV Congress) until 1943, the year in which Le Corbusier decided to anonymously publish a text that could be considered as “Manifest” to modern urban planning. The 1957 French edition of the Les Éditions de Minuit will follow carrying more appropriately the name of the French urban planner. For the English edition of “The Athens Charter” see: Le Corbusier, The Athens Charter, Grossman Publishers, New York, 1973 (with an introduction by Jean Giraudoux and with a new foreword by Josep Lluis Sert). For a historical reconstruction of the C.I.A.M. Group and the theoretical development that was produced see: E. Mumford, The CIAM Discourse of Urbanism, MIT Press, Cambridge (MA), 2002.

198

The phrase belongs to Le Corbusier in: Conversazione con gli studenti delle scuole di architettura, in Scritti, p. 388.

199

Le Corbusier, “Towards a synthesis”, in W. Boesiger (edited by) Œuvre complete. Volume 4: 1938–1946, Éditions d’Architechture, Zürich, 1964, p. 71.

200

Here the human needs are standardized in the services that domestic tools allow. See: Le Corbusier, La Carta di Atene. Manifesto e frammento dell’urbanistica moderna, pp. 478–479. See also: Le Corbusier, L'art decoratif d'aujourd'hui, Flammarion, Paris, 2009, pp. 71–81. Id., “Bisogni-tipo mobili-tipo”, in Scritti, pp. 139–144.

201

See: H. Lefebvre, The Urban Revolution, pp. 151–164.

202

See: A. Huxley, Brave New World, Harper Collins Publishers, New York, 2000. T. Adorno, Aldous Huxley and utopia, in Prisms, MIT Press, Cambridge (MA), 1981.

203

Situationist International, “Geopolitic of Hibernation” (n. 7, 1962), in K. Knabb (edited by), Situationist International Anthology, Bureau of Public Secrets, Berkeley (CA), 2006, pp. 100–107. See also: G. Debord, “Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography” (Les Lèvres Nues, n. 6, 1955), in Situationist International Anthology, pp. 8–11. A. Kotányi, R. Vaneigem, “Basic Program of the Bureau of Unitary Urbanism” (n. 6, 1961), in Situationist International Anthology, pp. 86–89.

204

H. Lefebvre, “La vie sociale dans la ville”. in Du rural à l’urbain, p. 146.

205

H. Lefebvre, “Proposition pour un nouvel urbanisme”, in Du rural à l’urbain, pp. 193–195.

Titel: The Lefebvrian Lexicon
verfasst von: Francesco Biagi
Verlag: Springer International Publishing
Buch: Henri Lefebvre's Critical Theory of Space
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-52366-4

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-030-52367-1

Copyright-Jahr: 2020
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-52367-1_2

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