The Ugly Face of Progress
From BERTRAND DE JOUVENEL
PARIS
DROGRESS means continuous growth of the r social patrimony, a successive increase in the assets handed on by each generation of fathers to the generation of sons. Of this we are keenly conscious, and our policies are ever more syste- matically addressed to the increase of such in- tangible assets as education, and of such tangible assets as productive equipment, or. transport and communication facilities.
It takes a great effort of imagination to pic- ture so complete a reversal of the present state of affairs that, instead of attending to the in creasing of social assets, we would find their store dwindling, and were addressing sporadic efforts merely to preserving some part thereof from destruction or deterioration. It would, indeed, be the sign that we had entered a Dark Age if we counted it as victories that we have safeguarded at least this power station, at least that school. What a fanciful picture! Unfortu- nately, it is not so fanciful in terms of environ- mental assets.
Note how the words 'preservation,' safeguard- ing,' significant of a rearguard action, figure in the programmes of the highly commendable bodies which battle for the seemliness of our countries. Even more telling is the commercial expression 'beauty spots': its advertising appeal testifies to a widespread feeling that this is indeed a matter of 'spots' subsisting in an en- gulfing sea of ugliness.
Art treasures are hoarded in museums: but how 'often does a man visit them? Historic monuments are kept up; but while Notre-Dame was constantly visible to a mediaeval Parisian, it is not so for one who works' and lives in the Paris conurbation of today. Indeed, masterpieces are not so important in our life as the charm of its daily setting. It is what you see from your window, or while going to work, or when lifting your eyes from your work, that constitutes either a boon or an injury.
Is sensitivity to the environment through the 'Died waiting . . . ?' eye (and the ear as well) an aristocratic squeam- ishness which may therefore be disregarded in a democratic age? This is a most impertinent assumption. It is the assumption on which tenements were raised, and clangorous factories. In fact, such insensitivity is rarer, and mostly to be found in those masterful men who brutally drive in pursuit of their purpose, with no eye or ear for anything else. Go to any old village of Europe, see how pleasing a pattern the houses make up, and how their roofs merge into the landscape, and how the trees are distributed in relation to the curves, and what 'the beauties of Nature' owe to the slow modelling achieved by countless generations of obscure workers: to my mind, there is no higher lesson in esthetics; and it is to the descendants of the simple people who created such beauty that nowadays one dares deny any aesthetic wants!
The great handicap of the good people who defend 'sites' is that they unwittingly accept the alternative 'progress or beauty,' in which case they must lose. Of course, technological pro- gress is good: if some have forgotten from what back-breaking tasks for man and woman, from what dearth and destitution, it has rescued the multitude, let them see what the situation is in the underdeveloped countries! As har- binger of popular welfare, technological pro- gress undoubtedly deserves right of way. It would be silly and cruel to stand for a graceful scenery against the production of useful com- modities. But this would be an absurd mis- statement of the present problem. A quite different statement is appropriate to our times.
In the early stages of the industrial era, a sharp contrast was drawn between luxury goods and wage goods: the latter were of low quality, and sold by weight or length, without any attempt to' make them attractive; these wage goods were thought of by both manufacturer and merchant as so needed by the poor that it was superfluous to improve their appearance, a
feature important only in the case of luxury goods addressed to the rich. A most hateful dis- tinction, abolished thanks to the improvement of living standards due to industrial progress itself. And now great attention is paid by businessmen who produce for mass consump- tion to what they call the 'styling' of products' Such attention implies recognition by the busi- ness community that the people care for the looks of things. But if 'looks' matter, even in the case of a packet of cigarettes, meant to be thrown away, how much more do they matter in the case of an environment wherein we find our. selves permanently?
That people care for harmonious scenery' rural or urban, is attested by the folders of tourist agencies; but if people are willing to travel far in search of beauty, why deny it to them as their daily lot? That the march of pro• gress must perforce trample beauty and sots' ugliness is a novel belief which would have amazed the Italian or Flemish forerunners of our industrial age: their towns improved in beauty as they improved in wealth, and I find it 3 judgment against us that we escape from our surroundings to admire their achievement, when our far greater means should have led us to outdo them. In their time, everything that was built for utility was built with an eye to its decor tive value: this association persisted until the eighteenth century, when even military barracks were handsome structures. A brutal divorce occurred in the nineteenth century, and it has' with us, become almost an article of faith that what is useful must be offensive to the eye.
We never stop to ask whether petrol stations need be garish as water wells and drinking troughs were not, or whether 'drive-in' restaurant' need be ugly as coaching inns were not. We cer" tainly do not expect that new office buildings. public or private, shall improve the appearance of our city. We are, quite reconciled to the e%. pectation that an improvement in the facilities should mean a deterioration in the appearance.
But this is a very dangerous attitude. Since the war, a great, and urgently required, building boom has developed throughout Europe. We, hope and trust that it will proceed, and MD speculation is an unwholesome proof of such belief. That this great and desirable, activity changing the face of each of our countries Is already obvious: by 1980, neither England or France will look at all as they did in my youth. At present, the chances are that they will look much worse: the whole point of my remarks 15 that such deterioration is by no means the fleas' sary counterpart of progress, that an attitude of defeatism in this respect wrongs our desalt' dants, to whom we should hand on an abode more graceful as well as more convenient than we have received, and that this is by no mean' impossible, if our concern for progress conies to include a concern about the face of progress. The evil we have to combat is, I am afraid.
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quite deep-rooted. While architects used to bt.e interested in blending their constructions ‘Otue the landscape, it seems that many in our thilo are in that respect indifferent or even eager t, show what they can inflict upon the landscape •, such are those who delight in standing a 111,18„,‘, sandwich on its slice, even more pleased if ti can turn it into a glass case. When I was a Oa boy, Anatole France gave me a glass housing a colony of ants. It had three redoef', ing features: it was small, not huge; horizont,yi not vertical; it housed ants, not men. And 01'i they seemed very pleased when I allowed the to escape from it.
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