Respect for traditional knowledge and housing as a right: the axes of the Barcelona Declaration

Barcelona"The planet does not negotiate. Climate collapse, war, displacement, and a technological acceleration that surpasses the profession are not topics for a congress. They are the conditions within which architecture works today": thus begins the Barcelona Declaration of the UIA Architects Congress, which concludes this Thursday at the International Convention Center of Barcelona (CCIB). "Every formal decision leaves a measurable trace. A material is already a carbon footprint. A housing typology is already a statistic of who will survive the next heatwave. A footprint is already territory taken, or left, from another species," says the text read by the president of the Superior Council of Architects' Colleges of Spain, Marta Vall-llosera.

The declaration includes six "positions," one for each thematic line of the congress. "We sign them as a profession that has decided to stop describing the crisis and start responding to it," says Vall-llosera. "Every act of construction must intelligently employ technology and traditional knowledge," states the point related to time and the future. Regarding circularity, the position is this: "We declare that what already exists is the first material. Every act of construction must be responsible for the global cost." The manifesto also calls for abandoning anthropocentrism, and in the field of housing, they declare that "housing is a right, not the return on an investment." "This right is non-negotiable," they emphasize.

Another of the congress's lines has been planetary awareness. "We declare that every act of building has consequences beyond its own walls. Local acts also have planetary consequences," warned Vall-llosera, who concluded her speech by saying: "We declare that quality and beauty are not privileges, but what the profession owes to everyone. History will not ask what we wrote in Barcelona. It will ask what we built from it."

Reflection to develop new forms of governance

In the event, the honorary president of the congress, the architect and urban planner Joan Busquets, also spoke. "We must reflect on the problems, we must observe them in order to imagine different forms of governance that are effective and beneficial for the entire population," said Busquets, who also spoke of the "universal priority" of housing and the need to be "sensitive and creative" to find new ways to solve the problem of access to housing. "We must analyze and understand the problems of Europe, peace, commitment and hope. Our objectives are very aligned with European foundations and with our challenges. And we hope that the UIA congress in Beijing will give the European Union a new and balanced future strategy," said Busquets. Regarding audience figures, the congress ended with 10,000 registered participants and about 30,000 attendees at the different conferences.

The president of the UIA, Regina Gonthier, praised the organizers and commissioners. "It has been exceptional, we will never forget it - Gonthier said -. I want to thank the commissioners, young people, who have brought fresh air and a new way of thinking and seeing things. The congress felt too short for me. I haven't been able to assimilate everything that has been said here yet. I only have a personal impression: now I am much more aware that we are not alone on this planet, that we cannot act in isolation, and that there are leaderships that we must respect, and this should be part of the points to consider. The level has been very high, I am convinced that Beijing will have an excellent reference".

The ceremony concluded with the handover of the UIA flag by the mayor of Barcelona, Jaume Collboni, to the vice-mayor of Beijing. "We are in a transition between an old world that has not died and a new world that has not yet been born, and you have participated these days in the construction of this new world, a better world," said Collboni.