We need to rehabilitate, not regenerate

COMMENT: In 2006, north London-born artist Amy Winehouse sang: “They tried to make me go to rehab but I said no, no, no”… this addict didn’t want to clean her system and the story lives on in infamy. Rehabilitation is defined as the action of restoring someone to health or normal life. A process to clean out, to rebalance to regrow. We should not make and accept sick cities as normal. To me this is a result of our lexicon of language and thinking in terms such as “regeneration”. Regeneration has a definition of spiritual renewal or revival, however I question what’s the spirit of real estate? It appears to be one based in urban economy rather than urban ecology, and as Bob Marley said: “Money is numbers and numbers never end. If it takes money to be happy, your search for happiness will never end.” By thinking in terms of urban ecology – the scientific study of the relation of living organisms with each other and their surroundings in the context of an urban environment – we would be using different languages. We would be using terms such as “reciprocity”; the process of mutual exchange as equals. The difference being that regeneration would bring a new hardware store into an area, rehabilitating it would be knocking on someone’s door asking if they need to borrow a hammer. We don’t need to regenerate communities, we need to rehabilitate the land and place they live in. Let’s not be the body-building steroid addict insisting people work out at the gym, let’s be the nutritionist helping balance people’s systems to allow them to live a health-centred life. We don’t have the right to tell a community they need to be regenerated. Using classist and colonial language only goes to show how long a journey the industry has in understanding its own fallacies and legacies in structural racism. The blessed irony is that London is likely to get cleaner air from two black mothers who are citizens, not urbanists or certification issuers. They campaign from a place of pain as experts of the lived reality of urban life, while no real estate executive leads by example. Rosamund Adoo Kissi-Debrah’s daughter Ella died from seizures relating to asthma developed as a result of living adjacent to the Lewisham South Circular. There is currently an inquest where a coroner is judging the extent to which failings by government enabled “death by air pollution” – potentially a landmark case for cities. Did Rosamond need her community to be regenerated as is constantly being sold to her? Or did she need the area to be rehabilitated to allow her children to grow up with dignity and opportunity? Angela Fonso doesn’t want her neighbours stuck in their homes breathing from oxygen tanks because a former gas works is being “regenerated” in Southall. Southall has community strength, solidarity and life that most “regenerated” places would wish they had. Did Angela want her neighbourhood regenerated? Or did she want her two children to be able to play outside with their friends in the neighbourhood without fear of what happens when inhaling benzene and naphthylamine? If you were a young person of colour, why would you dedicate your career to the people who want to regenerate you, your memories, your family’s history, your community’s solidarity? Maybe you’d want to work for the people who rehabilitated the environment, cleaned up the air, lowered noise pollution, gave agency and greater dignity to your friends and family, and made it easier for your mum to sleep at night as she got older? If we as a predominantly white, middle-class and male-heavy industry actually took the time and humility to reflect why “the pipeline of diverse talent is shallow”, it might understand the structural reasoning. If people meant what they said in the summer by “black lives matter” then go support Angela and Rosamond because right now the industry doesn’t – it just says “here’s what we think is best for you.” Language can win or lose an election, career or friendship. What are your rehab plans for 2021? Josh Artus is co-founder and director of Centric Lab Picture © David McHugh/Shutterstock