– How does architecture respond to the urgent issues of our time which manifest through successive environmental, political, and social crises?

– How does the collective way of life and behavior of a society relate to the characteristics of the built and unbuilt urban or peri urban environment and public infrastructure?

– How can participatory planning methodologies have a catalytic impact by encouraging or discouraging spatial and behavioral changes of societies and living places towards achieving sustainability and resilience?

The course seeks answers with correlations between planning and contemporary areas of thought and research related to ecology and democracy, such as political ecology, permaculture, degrowth, integrated planning, positive development, the transition movement, participatory planning, and action research. Examining their origins, reasoning, and the mechanisms they employ, we explore the ways in which design is directly or indirectly affected or implicated by reviewing examples and applications. Finally, we are concerned with emerging roles of design, architecture, and the profession of architecture in a rapidly changing world. Athens is the field of inquiry and of design exercises.

The course is conducted in the form of an urban workshop with theory presentations by the instructor and invited theorists and creators.