The Saudi government's plans to develop the Neom region and build the city of The Line are a PR success story. Reproduced visuals and slogans about sustainability and innovation translated into dozens of languages are just a facade. Behind it lies a brutal policy of displacement and forced evictions. Protesters are repressed, sentenced to death and even murdered. What must happen for the Western architectural studios involved in this project to take a stand on this issue? Do human rights and common decency stand a chance in the clash with egos and economic interests?
Visualization of The Line
photo: NEOM press materials
In mid-2022, the Saudi government released plans for the construction of The Line, a 500-meter-high linear city that will stretch 170 kilometers. The perpendicular megastructure covered with mirrored facades is to be just 200 meters wide. The Line is part of the Neom, which includes projects spread throughout the Arabian Gulf region, including the first open-air ski slope in this part of the world. According to the investors' announcement, the city, which will eventually house 9 million people, is to be completely intelligent, automated and emission-free. Linearity and a high-speed transportation system are expected to minimize travel time within the city, with most needs taken care of within a five-minute walk (which also includes vertical transportation).
city or prison?
Visualization of The Line
photo: NEOM press materials
Critics point out that the imbrication of technology, but also the structure of the city resembling an artificial canyon, is meant to provide authorities with a high level of control and consideration of residents' activities. Ultimately, the city will simply be a repeatedly scaled prison-like corridor that lacks privacy, wildness and open spaces that were not designed. It is an instrument of both soft and hard power, a symbol and physical manifestation of the ambitions of a brutal regime that wants to modernize its image. And the ideal tool for this purpose is modern, futuristic architecture designed by international (simply Western) stars. Only will offices based in countries that respect human rights want to design in a context so far removed from the values of liberal democracy? Unfortunately, it seems that money and ambition have a higher value for architects than human rights and the values derived from them.
a naive vision
But isn't the ambitious vision of a zero-emission city worth such sacrifices and compromises? The question is how pure the intentions and how feasible the assumptions are. Even assuming the postulated zero-carbon performance of this megabuilding is achievable, the environmental costs associated with the gigantic levels of embedded carbon required for its construction will be nearly impossible to balance in a reasonable time. As experts note, the standard of living at The Line will depend primarily on heavy maintenance and ongoing repairs, complex control systems and meeting the needs of residents.
Location of The Line
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Another argument that arises in the discussion of the environmental impact of The Line is the disruption of the balance of local ecosystems, the interruption of animal migration paths, and the diversion of winds. Ensuring that a city of 9 million people has access to adequate drinking water supplies will also be problematic.
Utopian thinking is important; it helps us challenge the biases in the built environment that have created conventional solutions, which we know contribute to environmental degradation. But I think the arguments about sustainability and living comfort are naive here.
Philip Oldfield, University of New South Wales (UNSW) Sydney, dezeen.com
better not finish it
In the official materials, it is hard to find confirmation of who is in charge of the projects under construction at Neom. The executive director for urban design in the city is Giovanna Carnevali, formerly associated with Moscow's Strielka or the Mies van der Rohe Foundation, which she led from 2012-15. The list of offices involved in the project leaked to the media through an exhibition held in Riyadh. Although representatives of these studios do not confirm their participation in the project, they do not want to deny it either. Thus, they suggest that they are working on projects in this location, which, however, they cannot talk about. This is the strategy adopted by Thom Mayne, founder of the LA-based office Morphosis, which is to be responsible for the design of The Line, a linear skyscraper city.
The 2005 Pritzker Prize winner, in a lecture organized by the American Institute of Architects at New York's Center for Architecture, explained why he considers it important to participate in the design of large-scale assumptions. As dezeen reports, according to Mayne:
Scale is going to increase and we need to keep up with it. What is needed is the development of something much more complex, because architects take responsibility for shaping the world. And that responsibility comes with risks, as with all professions.
Thom Mayne
Orange County Museum of Art
photo: Wikimedia Commons / DarkNight0917
The mischievous note that Morphosis is having trouble taking responsibility for its fairly straightforward projects. The recently opened Orange County Museum of Art is a conglomeration of mismatched details, execution and design errors, unfinished ideas and stopgaps. In his harsh review for the Guardian, Owen Hatherley recalled in this context the words of Mayne himself, who stated in an interview that he "has no interest in finishing projects." In the case of The Line, it would be best if the project ended before it entered the development process.
a spineless collective
However, Morphposis is not the only well-known Western office involved in the Saudi regime's project. The list includes Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, Tom Wiscombe Architecture, Oyler Wu Collaborative, HOK, British studios Adjaye Associates and Peter Cook's studio CHAP, Austria's Coop Himmelb(l)au and Delugan Meissl Associated Architects, Italy's Studio Fuksas. Two Dutch offices, UNStudio and OMA, also listed in the exhibition stipulated that their participation ended in the early stages of the competition.
In addition to the studios involved in The Line project, those working on other elements of the entire Neom, which includes the floating octagonal city-port Oxagon, the luxury island of Sindalah designed by Luca Dini Design and Architecture (to be completed first in 2024), a mountain resort designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, UNStudio, Aedas, LAVA and Bureay Proberts. Ultimately, Neom is to consist of 10 different parts designed by international teams.
the tyrant or the ideal client
Neom is just one of the megalomaniacal projects designed to modernize Saudi Arabia and change its image on the international stage. Reforms gained significant momentum after 2017, when Mohammed bin Salman became the country's de facto leader. His government's Saudi Vision 2030 strategy(PDF) aims to make the country's economy independent of oil, develop tourism and improve the situation of women. However, the transformation comes at a price—at the same time as changes seeking to introduce elements of a green economy in the still oil-driven country or loosening legislation on women's rights, the government in Riyadh is stepping up anti-terrorism efforts. Activists, some clerics and the indigenous population, who often oppose bin Salman's policies, are becoming victims of these policies.
Mohammed bin Salman
photo: Wikimedia / Navy Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class Kathryn E. Holm
There has also been a significant increase in the number of death penalty designations and executions carried out. A recent report by Reprieve and the Berlin-based European Saudi Organization for Human Rights (ESOHR) says the number has nearly doubled since 2015. It found that an average of 70 executions were carried out between 2010 and 2014, while the number rose to 129 between 2015 and 2022. The last six years have been one of the bloodiest in the kingdom's recent history.
greenwashing
Visualization of The Line
photo: NEOM press materials
The country's vision for development, which includes architecture and urban design, materialized in The King Salman Charter for Architecture and Urbanism, adopted in 2022 . It outlines guidelines for designers to learn from heritage to design the country's future. The charter sets six main values—authenticity, continuity, human-centricity, livability, innovation and sustainability. And it is these values that must fit into projects in the country, such as Neom, becoming part of the modernization propaganda of this authoritarian country. There is no mention of human rights or social issues—and it is in this area that observers are most concerned.
doomed to die
activists sentenced to death
photo: ALQST
In order for the huge new city to be built, the current residents of the area must be resettled. The struggle for their land, the ability to continue local traditions and the right to live in Tabuk province, even if it takes a peaceful form, can end tragically. January 23, 2023. Saudi Arabia's Criminal Court of Appeals has upheld death sentences against three members of the Huwaitat tribe—Shadli, Ibrahim and Ataullah al-Huwaiti—over their opposition to forced evictions from the Neom area. Their last chance is an appeal in the Supreme Court, but if it too upholds the verdicts, the three men will face immediate execution. They were tried on a series of vague charges under the Anti-Terrorism Law in connection with their peaceful protests, including Twitter activities, in opposition to the construction of Neom on lands traditionally inhabited by their tribe.
first victim
The three men sentenced to death are not the first victims of the regime implementing the megacity project. Shadli Ahmed Mahmoud al-Huwaiti is the brother of Abdul Rahim al-Huwaiti, who was shot dead by security forces in April 2020 at his home in al-Khariba, the part of Tabuk province earmarked for the Neom project, after he posted videos on social media opposing the displacement of local residents.
a call for help remains unanswered
Visualization of The Line
photo: NEOM press materials
Following the human rights violations associated with the Neom project, representatives of a number of organizations are speaking out, calling on the companies involved to withdraw or take a stand. Unfortunately, Western architectural firms seem to have turned a deaf ear to the appeals of organizations such as ALQST for Human Rights, which monitors the situation.
These death sentences are part of a series of cruel and vindictive actions against members of the Huwaitat tribe, who have been threatened with eviction, displacement, arrest, and now the harshest of punishments, for simply speaking out. Now, more than ever, it's time for companies involved or considering involvement in the Neom project to speak up.
Lina al-Hathloul, Head of Monitoring and Advocacy at ALQST
Amnesty International's Peter Frankental, in an interview with dezeen, bluntly stated that architectural studios are „profiting” from Neom's alleged human rights violations, which puts them in a moral dilemma and the need to rethink their involvement in the giant project. Frankental does not accuse the designers of acting illegally however, he notes that the price of their project and financial gain is forced displacement, often carried out in violation of the law.
It is the Saudi government that is responsible for these violations, but [architectural studios] will benefit from them.
Peter Frankental, Amnesty International for dezeen
The companies hired by the Saudi government must be aware of the human rights violations, violence and sentences involved in realizing the vision of the megacities they draw. The international organization is therefore calling for a rethinking of the withdrawal from the project. Unfortunately, none of the offices involved have publicly addressed the situation in Tabuk.
looking away
Visualization of the Oxagon
photo: NEOM press materials
Although none of the Polish offices occupies such a prominent international position to participate in a project of this scale, the catchy topic of the megacity has also found the attention of journalists. Industry media tend to deal exclusively with the architectural dimensions of Neom and overlook its social and political context. And while even from an architectural perspective Neom may seem like an overscaled, outdated megalomaniacal project of an authoritarian government, such criticism is not enough. Reporting on the victims of the ongoing operations should be the first and foremost issue addressed in Western reporting. Otherwise, we are faced with the unreflective duplication of the criminal regime's propaganda. Such a strategy is, of course, in favor of both investors and architects.
The question—what has to happen for a major Western office to abandon its participation in such a project. Since the limit is not the death of one man, nor the sentencing of three more to execution, it is hard to imagine what scale of tragedy would appeal to the architects involved and the media reporting on the project to speak out.
Visualization of The Line
photo: NEOM press materials
