Yavor Tarinski

If we place equality only as an aim for the distant future, then we have already lost the fight. Instead, let it be the foundational basis on which we begin building, from today, a more just and democratic society.

Only by shifting decision-making power away from bureaucratic institutions (like parliaments) and mechanisms (like the profit-driven capitalist market) towards grassroots participatory organs (such as popular assemblies and councils of delegates) that a new, much more sustainable, ecological, and democratic future can emerge.

The absence of a right to housing should be viewed as an act of violence, as yet another means of keeping people engaged in a passive consumerist lifestyle.

Ultimately, the question of democratic and ecological cities is a deeply political one, as it requires the collective deliberation of the future we want.

According to the underlying form of social organization, architecture can promote individualist lifestyles, servitude, submission, or it can encourage communal solidarity, freedom, and dignity.

As philosopher Cornelius Castoriadis underlines, the equality among citizens of Ancient Athens was not based on the granting of equal passive ‘rights’, but active general participation in public affairs.