Sustainability or Segregation?

The article “In Arabian Desert, a Sustainable City Rises” by Nicolai Ouroussoff (New York Times, September 25 2010) raises very interesting questions about the underlying tensions that can be packaged within social innovations—especially when this takes the form of developing an entire city.

At first, the city of Masdar sounds like something that belongs in a sci-fi novel more than on present-day Earth. Once I got over the initial shock factor of the technology being implemented at Masdar City-- like a network of underground electric cars that move without tracks or user steering, with only walkways on the surface--my attentions turned to the social tensions that Ouroussoff highlights. The design features of Madsar City are truly outstanding. But does Masdar City represent important research in how to develop a planned, environmentally friendly and sustainable city, or is it a way to create an ideal living situation—a “utopia” that does not include the harder facts of life, including living with the less fortunate or in less than desirable conditions?

Drawing from my own limited research on Madsar City's progress and goals, my feeling would be that it is somewhere between the two.

Ouroussoff believes the latter, and writes, “Its utopian purity, and its isolation from the life of the real city next door, are grounded in the belief—accepted by most people today, it seems—that the only way to create a truly harmonious community, green or otherwise, is to cut it off from the world at large.”

As a side note, it is important to mention that Ouroussoff’s article was released about two years ago, and much has changed in the plans for Masdar City. The article “Masdar City: The World’s Greenest City?” in TIME (January 25, 2011) offers a slightly more up to date read. Even though this article was just released 4 months later, Masdar’s vision changed slightly during this time.

Some changes include:

• Masdar City was originally scheduled to be completed in 2015, but the date has been pushed back (according to the city’s website, to 2025)
• The goal for zero carbon emission has been changed to low carbon emission
• Transportation will not run solely on PRT (Personal Rapid Transit) cars, but also on electric busses and other mass transit as well

As Mike pointed out in his blog post, it would be unfair to assume that Masdar City is a merely a utopia for the wealthy because a) it will house more than just those with expendable incomes, instead favoring scientists and researchers, and b) it is still in the early stages of its development. Masdar City’s main purpose is to drive sustainability and create energy solutions, and the benefits that could come from such studies can improve life for the population of both the UAE and the world in general.  As Mike also mentions, it is possible that once the city is further developed, it will need to employ a full labor force and will likely support a wider range of inhabitants.

However, I do agree with Ouroussof’s point that the opportunities available in Masdar are not accessible to the common denominator. Graduate students, researchers, and scientists are the most likely to be able to live in the city, but for someone outside of the field, rising to this social status or level of education could be extremely difficult. If less highly skilled laborers were to be employed in Masdar City, they might find themselves with very little career mobility. The dangers of this would be a sharp split between service industry employees and high-level employees in the technology field or with advanced degrees, meaning making upward career steps could be intimidating and difficult.

This excerpt from the official website of Masdar City found on the “About Masdar” page describes Masdar in this way:

It is a community where cutting-edge cleantech research and development, pilot projects, technology testing, and construction on some of the world’s most sustainable buildings are all ongoing. As such, Masdar City offers a fertile environment that inspires creativity and growth to organisations operating in this strategic and dynamic sector. As an emerging hub and a magnet for talent, financial capital and entrepreneurship in the fast-evolving renewable energy and cleantech industry, Masdar City provides a unique competitive advantage to companies, other organisations and ancillary service providers operating in, and serving this sector. 

The language in this passage is very specific to the business and research side of the city, and inhabitants are discussed as “talent.” As a result, Masdar seems much more focused on long-term results  than the lives of citizens in the short run. For the most part, this makes sense. After all, the long-term goal of creating better energy solutions is incredibly important, and is the main reason for Masdar's existence. Can Masdar be considered a true social innovation, however, if it does not help to improve the lives of would-be citizens, who do not have the chance to live in such an environment?

As Ouroussoff points out, parts of Masdar City’s architecture are designed expertly to adhere to cultural standards of the UAE: apartment windows that do not face completely toward each other, for instance. But do these subtleties matter if Masdar City represents only a subset of the population?

Is Masdar City a “gated community”?

Is there an added responsibility for social innovations of Masdar City’s scale?

Is Masdar City a social innovation in the same sense as other ventures we have learned about in class?