Building institutions in Kabul in the 1960s. Sites, spaces and architectures of development cooperation

摘要

In this paper, I explore several instances of development cooperation between Afghan, Soviet, and other actors during the 1960s which amounted to 'institution building' in the field of architecture and urbanism. Particular attention is paid to the spaces that were produced as institutional arrangements became operational. By discussing the building of institutions as an architectural activity and as a political and cultural process, I propose to frame it as part of the production of space in the Lefebrvian sense. This reading of how urban space was negotiated and produced through institution building as an integral part of 'modernisation' and 'development' offers a specific approach to studying the export and transfer of architectural and spatial planning practices in the global Cold War era and a methodological proposition for architectural and urban research in general.