AUTONOMY OF A COMMUNITY: THE SUBJECTIVITY OF PARTICIPATION IN THE BAAN MANKONG HOUSING PROGRAMME

Abstract

The Baan Mankong national housing programme in Thailand, has been internationally as a success example of a participatory slum upgrading programme. Its goal is to empower slum-dwellers to take greater control of their housing situation and in the process integrate them with other stakeholders in the city. The programme makes use of horizontal linkages among the city’s poor to create a “new horizontal power delivery”, cutting out third parties from the process of housing. While architects still have a role in supporting this framework, this dissertation hypothesises that the programme has empowered the citizen through the participatory framework to be able to initiate further improvements to their living environment independently with the community replacing the role of architecture professionals. The hypothesis is explored through case studies of communities which have completed the upgrading by utilising mainly qualitative methods. The role of the architect and the community in the participatory process during the upgrading is framed by the duplicitous and subjective notion of “community participation” and multiple variables arise that complicate the route to empowerment. In answering the hypothesis, this dissertation finds that the lasting legacy of the programme may not be ‘empowerment’ of the people.