A digression: Turkey is a realm of centralized, opaque, and not necessarily benevolent institutions, and TOKI could be the paradigm. Not a public body per se, they are responsible for parceling out all public land between Turkey's developers. Quite critically, there is no real oversight to this mass distribution of wealth. Imagine a modern feudal system run on a pyramidal structure where the laypeople, i.e. multinational construction and development companies, subsist largely at TOKI's whim. It's not a market player, except with strings, and it's not a government organization. It's this free agent of force and the resulting chaos, and probably the primary factor in the existence of the built environment in Turkey. This is how I understand it. Not much is formally written in English, and the people I know who care can't seem to get a grip on it.
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| From ankara, mostly ulus |
Back to Duygu's story, the man is in office four months and the entire concrete ceiling of his office collapses onto him, putting him into the hospital for months. Basically, his efforts at internal reform had met with an administration well established with nepotism and the mafia (and poetic if murdurous irony, who knew?). He went promptly back to academia.
Another story is of a similar high-up and reform-minded official who was too famous to injure, but who's father was beaten to death while jogging.
We talked about environmental laws, both Turkey's and the EU acquis. I'll write a short blog on those at some point. The point, now, is that they are not followed. Neither are building codes. Anything not directly rendering money is made ineffectual by payoffs or blatant disregard. The result is a reality several detached from legislated promises or even institutional propaganda.
Taking this lovely picture as a priori, what is the point of bringing the new American "green building" here? For that is what I was doing. I came with my experience of green building, and thought I would try to find something to do with tit. But it fundamentally relies on attaching numbers to buildings, and for a system of accountability. The former may be feasible. I left today feeling the later is not. All that remains in the residue of this ideal is "greenwashing," the chimera of the movement.
So these stories frame my frustration today. I came home from the meeting with Duygu and Bilge feeling stupid, peripheral, and that I'm wholly missing the point here. (the point being...?) Maybe this is my first blog entry, the first one I need to write, because I feel stripped of a veneer of optimism about green architecture, my role here, and Turkey in general.
The result should be a redirection in this 11-month Fulbright. Currently, it has placed me firmly in the role of baffled observer and chronicler of relevant events in my general vicinity. I have my story to tell as well. My biggest desire is to find the fight for the environment here, especially in buildings. My biggest fear is there's virtually no fight to be had. Stay updated for more upbeat and forwards thinking entries.
