Strategies and Solutions from Vernacular Architecture to Sustainability • Urban and local strategies and solutions
• Fig. 4 The common infrastructural features of vernacular productive settlements: urban pattern scheme and hierarchical street network of Medina di Tunis, Tunisia (credits: B. Özel). Fig. 5 Aeral view comparison between the urban pattern and morphological features of the Medina of Marrakesh and its colonial city, Morocco (Map data: Google, DigitalGlobe).
In this period money exchange and notary services had a big development due to the increase in trading facilities. Since 1700, with the advent of the industrial revolution, the role of mankind in the production process has changed; improved technology and the development of machinery for particular sectors brought ‘automated production systems’. Moreover, the socio-cultural features of industrial communities required some distinctions with respect to pre-industrial ones; industrialization demands more rational, centralized and extra-community economic organization in which recruitment is based more upon ‘universalism’ than ‘particularism’ (Sjoberg 1955, pp. 438-445). Therefore, with the changing role of humans in production, the social structure of the community also changed. The prime difference between industrial and pre-industrial production is based on the type of ‘energy source’; while pre-industrial cities depended on the production of goods and services mainly through animate (human or animal) and local, natural sources, industrial cities satisfy their need of energy through inanimate and non-local, or mobile (steam power, electricity, etc.) sources (Sjoberg, 1955). Of course the changing systems of energy production brought positive effects to intensive production; thanks to inanimate energy sources that allowed production (food, goods and other services) to increase, population has risen today to seven billion people. The growth of modern industry led to massive urbanization as cities turned into centres of industrial production. Urban areas became increasingly more attractive for people since they offered new employment opportunities that stimulated a massive migration from rural to urban areas. At the same time, rapid urbanization caused several problems in terms of environmental, social and economic vulnerabilities in the face of abrupt demographic and climatic changes (Özel et al., 2014b). Therefore the concept of ‘self-sufficiency’ gains more importance each day in the search for increasing urban resilience.
Features of productive vernacular settlements Production in vernacular communities predominantly consists of agriculture and other basic sectors of craftwork that respond to the essential survival needs of the society. Agriculture is considered as the prime sector of production that procures food; it therefore constitutes the most essential survival activity in vernacular societies. The
103
other ‘basic needs oriented’ sectors are mostly related to craftsmanship such as smiths, locksmiths, tanners, shoemakers and carpenters. These sectors all regard the manufacturing of raw materials such as wood, iron, and leather in order to produce goods and objects for daily use as well as furnishings and building elements. In the field of building construction there are also stone masons, carpenters and lumberjacks who are specialized in the manufacturing of raw stone and wood. These specialized crafts are usually handed down from father to son or from master to apprentice in vernacular culture. Regarding raw materials of animal origin, butchers hold an important position; after slaughtering, they have the role of distributing skin, hair and animal fat to different sectors such as soap producers, tanners, leather workers and weavers. These methods of production are mostly based on animated sources such as manpower and therefore; the productivity remains at basic levels. In comparison with industrial societies where the intensity of production adapts to the population, in vernacular communities it is the population that has to adapt itself to the productive capacity and not the other way around. This is due to the fact that resources and energy are limited. Vernacular societies have the awareness that the maximum adaptation to nature, through the creation of the most adequate settlement morphology and social links can