In 1969, ‘The Architects' Resistance’, a collective of students from Yale University, Columbia University, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), published a manifesto titled ‘Architecture: whom does it serve?’
With this manifesto, the group sought to place the practice of architecture in a broader economic, social and environmental context than the one taught in their university lecture rooms. In just two and a half pages, we find a powerful call to reclaim a more social and ecologically conscious architecture. It unambiguously denounces the role architecture played during those years as a practice in service to those in power while adding that “the architect's submission to the system begins with the belief that they possess special skills and knowledge that are inaccessible to the general public.”
In the text, The Architects' Resistance also explains that such a bombastic and superior stance was reinforced by the idea that there are “those 'special' things that only architects know,” which enable them to ignore the real value of the profession and hide behind this way of thinking. In consequence, architects avoid taking on the true role they should play within society, which is to be not saviors but allies of the people who inhabit their buildings and cities.
