Visit my other book, Architecture & Design versus Consumerism online. In Amazon paperback & kindle.

Social Sustainability in Construction

When it comes to building construction, we most often read about environmental sustainability. But the UK’s 2012 Social Value Act (PDF overview from Social Enterprise UK) highlights one way construction touches upon social sustainability.

The Act requires public bodies in England and Wales to consider how the services they commission and procure might improve the economic, social and environmental well-being of the area.

The Guardian reports that Wates Group, one of the UK’s largest construction companies, is forming a brokering service that will help it identify and hire social enterprises.

The public sector accounts for 70% of Wates turnover, making it one of the major public sector contractors in the UK. Andy Hobart, of Wates, commented, “The construction industry offers great opportunities for major contractors and suppliers to work with social enterprises to achieve positive social and economic impact on communities. We are totally committed to increasing social enterprise as an integral part of our procurement process.”

An example of a company that will benefit from Wates’ approach is winning Brighton and Hove Wood Recycling Project.

The Guardian reports, “This project aligns to Wates’ commitments under its Reshaping Tomorrow initiative  (PDF ) to create 5,000 employment and training opportunities for disadvantaged groups by 2015.”

What are some other ways social sustainability touches upon construction? I’ve reported on some of these issues before over onthe design activism blog, in terms of the ethics of using exploited workers in construction. In positive terms. Lance Hosey points out, in his article “The Ethics of Brick” (2005), that at least one architect has chosen material specification as a way to address social sustainability:

“Max Bond of Davis Brody Bond has illustrated this for years in his work with African-American communities and organizations. Researching the membership of construction unions in New York City, his team learned that masonry unions include a relatively large percentage of minorities from Harlem. Accordingly the architects specified brick for projects such as Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. Bond says, ‘I have tried to make it as likely as possible that people of color would work on the construction of our buildings.’ The project reaches out to its constituent community not just through the end product but also through the acts of specification and construction. Call it material justice.”

I find that architecture students rarely come up against these issues in school, but they really deserve some awarness–and advance warning– of these elements of social sustainability in construction.

3 Responses to Social Sustainability in Construction

  1. Measured homes are getting to be more institutionalized in their over all development making them additionally engaging potential purchasers. This institutionalization, that makes retrofit and repair developments for the mortgage holder simpler and more advantageous have brought about a significant improvement when it comes opportunity to build another home.

  2. Pre-construction Services are additional services that some builders and construction managers will provide to clients at the front end of a construction project prior to starting. The main purpose of pre-construction services is to assist the client from the beginning of a project at project conception in achieving their design and budget goals. The end result of the pre-construction process is typically saving the client time and money.

  3. The basic truth is that most individuals inquiry online before making nearby little business buys. Assuming that you aren’t on the web, you aren’t an alternative. Regardless of the fact that you are on the web, assuming that you aren’t on the front page of Google for the magic words buyers utilization to discover items and administrations much the same as the ones you offer, you’ll probably never be found.

Leave a reply

Subscribe

About

Join me on the first Thursday of the month for ideas, tips and inspiration for teaching and researching sutainable design. Sign up to get these posts in your inbox.