January_1970 — Page 18

old expatriate governing class, and their institutions like the Royal Insti- tute of British Architects to be blamed for all the present ills. The economic failures, the educational short com- ings, the failure to produce a national architectural expression of the twen- tieth century and so on.

So far as Hong Kong is concerned the situation is perhaps quite unique. Most of the people of Hong Kong have come to Hong Kong because they pre- fer it to the place from whence they came! It is a place which they believe will give them opportunity nomic opportunity and personal free- dom of action and, in general, at all levels, in fact this is so.

eco-

There exists here the much dis- cussed gulf between the governors and the governed. There is no true elec- toral system providing for representa- tion. The system is one of government by a professional civil service and by consultation. The knife edge of politi- cal balance is preserved for the sake of trade and, in general, all parties seem, for the moment, to want it to remain

So.

Government is however schizo- phrenic to a marked degree. On the one hand it aligns itself completely behind the attitudes engendered by Hong Kong's remaining a trading post. It is effectively a great "Hong", as interested in extraction of maximum economic return from a deal in land and as rapacious as any private develop- er when for example the opportunity arises to modify a lease. Its land policy, although responsible for the creation of a tight-knit urban develop- ment which has positive values, not always granted by critics of the urban scene, can be largely blamed for the gradual creation of the highest living densities in the world and private sec- tor residential conditions fit for ani- mals rather than human beings.

—

It lets the developer do what he wants to a point where the physical environment created in the economic furore is almost unbearable in humani- tarian terms but in a quite contrary way its professionals have introduced into prevailing conditions an element of quality belied by the devotion to the laissez-faire "trading post" tag which it still accepts indeed adver-

tises.

The fact that almost a third of the rural population is now housed by government ог quasi government housing agencies in conditions far bet- ter than the majority of their fellows is in itself the largest justification of this

statement.

Min kim

Hong Kong society... 'entrepreneurial class, expatriate class and working mass”

Society in Hong Kong has long since accepted the hard economic facts of life. It has developed in a complete- ly pragmatic way. Its standards have been those which are achievable, not those of an idealist, and it has, step-by- step, drawn itself up by its own boot- straps. It works and it works and it works, in a way which is tiring to contemplate. It has by its own energies created its wealth out of the con- ditions of the barren rock. That this cameo is all too inadequate to truly represent the conditions which the architect faces must be quite obvious, but it will serve to emphasise certain points and attitudes which have a very great bearing on the work which we are producing.

Let us turn to the architects them- selves.

The Architects

The architects are of course a part of the society and in attempting to serve it, quite naturally, tend to be come party to it. Reference has been made to convinced architects and we must consider the architect as a leader in society and not one who merely follows meekly in the wake of prevail- ing trends.

Few people are trained, as arch. tects are, to see the environmental potential of a given set of circum- stances hedged about by all sorts of limitations, of materials, of ideas or of finance. None are trained to seek to co-ordinate, so as to achieve a totality of design from such a multiplicity of elements and processes.

The gap between training and achievement is very great and we have to accept that whereas the deep and humble understanding of the many elements and processes at the different

levels at which they need to be con- sidered is possible for many, an ability in synthesis is only rarely found.

It is perhaps invidious to pass judgement on colleagues in Hong Kong, but most would agree that in general the forces and demands of society have found an ultimate phy- sical expression which does not do much credit to the concept of the architect as a co-ordinator of various forces, for the sake of a greater achievement. The individualism of society has not demanded it. In fact usually the opposite extreme of atti- tude has proved the case and its architects have generally been quite unable to provide it.

If the question is asked, what sort of architects have we? The answer is that in common with other societies we have a fair share (some would say more than a fair share) of unprincipled characters who see the building pro- cess, from design to completion, as a series of opportunities for self gain.

We have 'tea house' (signing) archi- tects; those who cut their fees and their service to match (though un- suspecting clients may not realise this); those who see regulations only as a set of words legally conceived and giving opportunity for a game to find the loopholes capable of enriching their clients and themselves contrary to the spirit of these codes and so on.

―

We have a sprinkling, far too few, whose genuine concern to serve so- ciety to its best advantage is para- mount. A concern not always appre- ciated by even their clients. A few firms have however managed to find a level of pragmatic idealism. Firms which have come to terms with the economic insistance of the client, as one of the basic conditions, and who

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Far East BUILDER, January 1970