A Story of the Homeless and Anti-Social Behaviour

If I were to say that the architecture in our public spaces is ‘really speaking to us’, you would be forgiven for thinking this is a piece about the aesthetics of our cities. In some ways in fact, it is, but not in any artistic sense. I am not discussing a collection of monuments, town houses or grandiose buildings. Alas, the architecture I talk of is more humble and yet perhaps more sinister. There is a message encoded into it, within our parks, streets and centres, which when presented together, seems to be part of a wider narrative. This paper is an attempt to read it and find out what it says, but also, to set up a discussion on how we choose to read it. In short, this is a substantive example of a storytelling approach to political theory which I believe could help us when we wish to aspire to public engagement . I hope this example allows me to discuss the method behind it in the panel.