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在城市体系中数量较多的地级城市，在城市化与城市现代化的大潮中，城市的模样与味道越来越相像了。

去年夏天，某事务所策划并组织的11名国际青年建筑师，在贵阳市的“花溪CBD城市中心设计”中，展开一次“高密度城市自然的造城实验”，其设计图发布后引起巨大争议。

编者按：程绪珂，出生于1922年，1945年毕业于金陵大学，上海市建委科技委名誉顾问、教授级高级工程师，曾任上海市园林管理局局长、上海市绿化委员会副主任，离休后着重研究园林绿化走生态化途径这一重大课题，曾两次获得建设部科技进步二等奖和三等奖，并获得全国绿化奖章，享受国务院特殊津贴。日前，记者就生态园林这一主题登门采访了她。 　　她，博闻强识，子承父业，投身园林奋斗64载，至今不辍。她，在特殊年代，虽身陷囹圄，仍苦苦求索事业困境的破解之路。她，高举生态园林的旗帜，坦荡荡地接受异议和质疑，凭着坚韧与魄力，为上海今天的绿化格局奠定了扎实的理论和实践基础。然而，在与笔者交谈过程中，88岁高龄的她强调最多的一句话却是：“我只是沧海一粟，我只是集体中的一员。”她，就是原上海市园林管理局首任局长、我国著名园林专家程绪珂。 　　记　者：从20世纪70年代起，您就致力于生态园林的研究。这一研究的源起是什么？ 　　程绪珂：其实我并不是第一个提出生态园林理论的人。我父亲解放初期在课上就曾提出过城市园林建设要以生态学理论为指导，但当时并没有引起重视。文革期间，园林事业跌到了谷底，我也被迫离开了园林岗位。那时我脑子里就琢磨一个问题：“为什么每当开展政治运动时，园林老是挨批？明明是业务上的事为什么偏偏扯到政治？”我把父亲的言传身教与自己20多年的实践仔仔细细地梳理总结，终于找出了一个答案：以往园林绿化有一个重要误区就是单纯为了好看好玩，属于装饰性的，因此被贴上了“城市美容师”的标签，而没有认识到园林的生态功能，所以事业越做越小。后来，我重新回到岗位，阅读了大量的国内外资料，看到园林绿化已列为环境建设之一，并有了较大发展，更坚定了自己的想法和加快研究的紧迫感。 　　与程绪珂一样经历过那段特殊的岁月的园林人都在深刻思索着园林的过去与未来，“生态园林”理念的萌发，如石入湖心，激起了层层涟漪。1986年5月，中国园林学会城市园林与园林植物两个学术委员会在温州市联合举行“城市绿化系统、植物造景与城市生态问题”学术研讨会，会上正式提出了生态园林概念。此后，《生态园林论文集》（1990）和《生态园林论文续集》（1993）陆续出版。程绪珂在两本论文集中都发表了对生态园林建设任务、目标、标准等内容的专论，并提出生态园林建设的6种类型：观赏型、环保型、保健型、知识型、生产型和文化环境型。 　　记　者：那时上海是一种什么反应？ 　　程绪珂：我的一篇关于生态园林的讲稿被《中国日报》刊登，当时上海副市长倪天增看到这篇文章，叫我在上海区、县长绿化会议上讲生态园林，并且当即决定在普陀区和黄浦区的一些居住区率先开展试点。 　　1989年，在倪副市长的支持下，上海市绿化委员会和上海市园林管理局将“生态园林研究与实施”列为科研课题，在居住区、庭院、工厂、绿地等地搞了26处试点，并设立了11个巡查点，注重景观与功能结合，强调环境的使用性、活动性、观赏性和保健性。1990年国务院发展研究中心国际技术经济研究所上海分所主办了全国生态园林研讨班。此后，越来越多的专家学者加入到生态园林的研究队伍中来，像天津、石家庄、宁波、中山等一些城市也进行了实践探索。 　　记　者：生态园林的核心要解决什么问题？ 　　程绪珂：生态园林建设的核心就是保护环境，实现人与自然的和谐发展。尽管生态园林到现在也没有一个统一的定义，但我个人认为生态园林是继承和发展传统园林的经验，遵循生态学的原理，建设多层次、多结构、多功能、科学的植物群落，建立人类、动物、植物相联系的新秩序，达到生态美、科学美、文化美和艺术美。以经济学为指导，强调直接经济效益、间接经济效益并重，应用系统工程发展园林，使生态、社会和经济效益同步发展，实现良性循环，为人类创造清洁、优美、文明的生态环境。 　　记　者：这对园林人来说是个不小的挑战，您的解决途径有哪些？ 　　程绪珂：生态园林建设必须要把环境保护事业和园林绿化事业同党和国家的利益紧密联系起来。我们的园林工作者一定要打破旧的思想框框。第一，要打破唯观赏论。园林是城市发展不可或缺的有生命的基础设施。园林工作者要以生态观念来规划园林，大力开展低碳、碳汇植物群落的研究，为后代留下清洁的环境；第二，要打破“城市围墙”，坚定地走城乡绿化一体化的道路。城市经济是强势，生态是弱势，农村经济是弱势，生态是强势。在加强城区绿化建设同时，必须依托农村高质量的生态环境，通过城乡之间的绿色廊道，缓解城区的热岛效应和污染压力；第三，要打破狭隘的园林植物观。凡是植物，不论是蔬菜、果树、药材还是粮食都可以为我们园林所用，尤其是木本油料类的能源植物和其它具有生产功能的植物，更要引起我们园林工作者的重视；第四，要打破以往园林光有生态效益和社会效益，没有经济效益的形象。 　　绿地属于特殊的社会公共商品，会产生直接和间接经济效益。科学地进行绿化效益计算，比如像绿色GDP这类衡量城市生态水平的指标，能为城市管理者提供更有力的价值分析和决策支持。只有把生态、社会和经济紧紧结合起来，我们的园林事业才会越走越开阔，越干越光明。 　　1992年，国家园林城市创建活动在全国铺开。2004年，建设部在创建国家园林城市的基础上提出了创建国家生态园林城市的目标，并印发了《关于创建“国家生态园林城市”实施意见的通知》，而且只有获得“国家园林城市”称号的城市才能申报“国家生态园林城市”。“两个创建”得到了全国各省市政府的积极响应，深圳引人瞩目地成为首个示范城市。 　　记　者：您觉得可不可以跳过“园林城市”直接进入“生态园林城市”的创建？两个创建之间是一种什么关系？ 　　程绪珂：人均公共绿化面积、绿地率、绿化覆盖率是“园林城市”的硬指标，强调城市的绿量，为绿化基础薄弱的城市提供了一个明确的量化目标，为以后打好底子。“生态园林城市”是人和自然和谐发展的城市。建筑要向绿色建筑发展、城市经济要向循环经济发展、基础设施要向整体综合发展、城市环境要向生态景观发展、城市社会要向生态文化发展。“生态园林城市”的评估更注重城市生态环境质量，与“园林城市”的评比标准相比，增加了衡量一个地区生态保护、生态建设与生态恢复水平的综合物种指数、本地植物指数、城市热岛效应程度、公众对城市生态环境的满意度等评估指标。 　　我认为，两个创建是递进累积的关系，他们的共同目标是建设生态城市。生态城市是社会和谐、经济高效、环境良好，三者循环促进的人类居住形式的高级阶段。它的建设不可能一蹴而就，在时间上需要分解成逐步逼近的不同阶段，在空间上需要重视示范效应，不能一哄而起。城市可以带着生态园林城市的目标来创建园林城市，高标准地要求自己，将园林与农林大环境结合起来，制定广义的绿化系统规划。城市的管理者要有这种预见性。 　　记　者：通过不懈努力，2004年，寸土寸金的上海获得了“国家园林城市”的称号，尤其在中心区绿化方面取得了有目共睹的成绩，为特大型都市的可持续发展找到了一个突破口。有人说那是因为上海市“家底厚”，您怎么看？您觉得上海最有价值的经验是什么？ 　　程绪珂：这个跟家底厚不厚没多大关系，重要的是上海改善城市环境的决心，实事求是的态度和科学发展观的落实。典型的代表是2001年开放的上海延中绿地，目前是市中心面积最大的公共绿地，总面积达23hm2。它的建设就是为了缓解市中心越来越严重的热岛效应，可以说是“形势所迫”。为了跟踪绿地的降温降噪效果，园林部门设置了监测仪进行长期观察，取得了很多有价值的数据，为工作的顺利推进奠定了基础。 　　记　者：上海有没有走过弯路？ 　　程绪珂：大家都常说上海是个“海纳百川”的地方。的确如此。上海人欢迎新的理念、新的做法，吸收起来也快，但不是简单的照抄。在几十年的发展中，当然也走过一些弯路。刚刚改革开放那时，大家都出国去学习而且想搞些新东西，那时刮起了“巴洛克风”和“草坪风”，后来又是“大树进城风”、“彩叶树风”等等。但上海园林界很注意反省、总结这些实践的对错。一些不好的做法自己慢慢修正或者改掉了，因此总体上是健康有序的。 　　我想重点谈谈“大树进城”。我同意种大树，但我不赞成挖别人的山头滥用野生植物资源、破坏别人的生态来满足自己环境的做法。这既违背了城乡绿化一体化的方向，而且胸径在十几厘米的树苗几年后比外地搬来的“砍头树”实际表现也更好。在工厂、道路改造过程中有许多能够再利用的大树，我们可以通过专门部门储备起来，还有就是从正规的集约化生产苗木基地定购大树，这些都是可取的做法。在上海的市政工程中还是比较注意这点。而一些开发商为了尽快把楼盘卖出去，搞速成景观，廉价从外地挖大树，又缺乏科学的养护手段，使得大树的成活率就更低了。这种为了片面追求经济利益，牺牲生态和社会效益的做法十分令人心痛！好在，大家现在对这一点都有重新认识。 　　记　者：上海下一步的目标放在哪里？ 　　程绪珂：按照联合国对于生态城市的要求绿化覆盖率要在50%，人均绿化90m2。上海要达到这些指标需要经过相当长期的努力奋斗。因此，在上海城市总体规划修编时，根据自己的实际情况，提出了建立“生态型城市”的目标，作为向生态城市努力的阶段性目标，而没有盲目地提出要建立“生态城市”。所谓“型”，就是式样、类型、模子的意思。 　　这一战略目标的实施时限为5 0 年， 分三个阶段：第一阶段从2001-2010年，5年建框架，5年创国内领先，基本达到清洁、优美、舒适的目标，其中绿化前5年达到国家园林城市，后5年构建创建生态园林城市的框架；第二阶段是2011-2030年，求质变、上台阶，实现经济、社会、生态环境的协调发展，其中2020年绿化基本达到生态园林城市标准；第三阶段从2031-2050年，资源高置换化，产业高效益化，流通高节能化，环保高质量化，绿化高功能化，社会高祥和化，管理高现代化。 　　记　者：20多年前，您曾预言过园林发展的方向，一是生态学原理和实践的引入与结合；二是包括生物工程、计算机等新技术在园林上的应用。现在这些已经成为普遍的共识。您能否再谈谈对未来园林发展的判断？ 　　程绪珂：思想还要再解放。世界那么大，考虑问题要广，不要狭隘。北京最近在提“广义的绿地系统”，很科学，符合生态观念。它把农林、江河湖海山等自然资源都包括在内，同时避免了与农争地、与林争地的情况。因此说，思想观念要改变，总是老一套不行。 　　此外，植物群落功能要在定性的基础上做更多的量化分析，例如哪些植物在一起能最大地发挥汇碳功能，哪些植物配在一起能最好地发挥降温作用，哪些可以对人体的心、肝、目等部位有好处。这些我们跟华东师范大学和复旦大学合作对100多种植物开展过研究，投入了大量的人力物力，但还远远不够。植物材料是建设生态园林持续发展的主体，如何更合理、科学地做好植物造景，还有许多工作。这也是科学发展观在园林行业的反映。 　　我们要有自然资本储备概念。自然资本由资源、生命系统和生态系统构成，而且目前在以一种前所未有的速度不断衰退。生态园林建设在城市中承担着创造人工“第二自然”的重任，它所创造的生态效益是自然资本的储备。 　　未来园林还应该在传承文化方面下更大功夫。现在很多城市都开始有意识地强化自己的地域文化，园林是文化的重要载体之一。但目前有的设计手法比较生硬，符号多，底蕴浅。台北植物园潘国俊博士将《诗经》中提到的植物收集起来，在“诗经植物区”中展览，自然科学与古典文学能融为一体。游人既能品味诗句，又能了解植物的形态和历史，一举多得，寓教于乐。这种动脑子的做法，值得借鉴。 　　程绪珂一生主编、撰写的书稿众多。1984年陈俊愉院士与她共同主编的《中国花经》，历时8年完成，有“中国花卉百科全书”之美誉，至今仍是国内花卉专著方面不可逾越的一座高峰。随后又用8年时间主编了《中国野生花卉图谱》。2006年她的再一本8年之作，与胡运骅共同编写的《生态园林的理论与实践》出版。该书获得国家科学技术学术著作出版基金，并获2006首届全国“三个一百”原创科技图书奖。鲜为人知的是，程绪珂在这本书的编写过程中一度陷入左眼失明的病情。为了能完成这本书，八十多岁的她“豁出去”接受了激光治疗。 　　记　者：您是“三个8年三本书”。现在您的健康状况如何？能否再跟我们的读者聊聊《生态园林的理论与实践》这本书的情况？ 　　程绪珂：身体不太好，但上海有好的展览之类的活动，我还会跟老朋友一起去看看。对于《生态园林的理论与实践》这本编了8年的书，我想说，它是在动态实践中摸索着写出来的，能够顺利出版完全是依靠了全国几十位业内同行无私地贡献了自己的专长和才能，也使我进一步认识到集体力量的伟大。在编写这本书之前，我去了三四十个城市参观学习，跟同行们探讨生态园林；编写过程中，又得到了许多鼓励和支持，因此说，它是集体智慧的结晶。 　　尽管这本书获得了一些荣誉，但与现在的形势仍然有距离，不是十全十美的，仅仅是生态园林理论与实践的开头。现在我们都年纪大了，但事业的发展不能因人的轮换而更换，理论与实践总是在不断发展，希望我们的中青年一辈园林人能与时俱进，继续事业，沿着这条“自然之道”走下去。 　　记　者：再次感谢您接受我们的采访，也祝愿您身体健康！

“中国城市空间的虚无化，所牵涉的不仅是城市竞争力或在未来世界城市格局中的地位问题，更是中国的民族文化以及各城市的地方文化的生存，传承，衔接，转型的问题，是市民的文化认同和地方归属感的问题。这里的城市文化不是政治经济所利用的工具，它直接关系人的存在状态，生活世界和意义世界。只有我们认识到这点并贯穿于城市发展之中，也许才能稍稍抵制或限制城市空间的虚无化及相伴的问题。 ”

我国的城中村与19世纪西方的贫民窟具有较多相似性，二者都是以进城农民为主的流动人口低成本居住区。简要比较19世纪前后西方国家的贫民窟问题与当前国内的城中村问题，指出城中村问题将具有长期性，社会问题和流动人口问题是解决城中村问题的关键。

1999年6月23日，国际建协第20届世界建筑师大会在北京召开，大会一致通过了由吴良镛教授起草的《北京宪章》。《北京宪章》总结了百年来建筑发展的历程，并在剖析和整合20世纪的历史与现实、理论与实践、成就与问题以及各种新思路和新观点的基础上，展望了21世纪建筑学的前进方向。
　　这一宪章被公认为是指导二十一世纪建筑发展的重要纲领性文献，标志着吴良镛的广义建筑学与人居环境学说，已被全球建筑师普遍接受和推崇，从而扭转了长期以来西方建筑理论占主导地位的局面。

一个建筑师，一个艺术评论家，谈到中国当代建筑，一样有心杀敌，无力回天。

《世界城市状况报告》由联合国人居署编著出版，两年一版，自2001年问世以来已经发行三版（分别为2001、2004/2005、2006 /2007），是人居署根据城市人口和城市政策制定者所面临的现实问题，对人居议程所涉及的主要领域进行监测、分析的专门报告。

根据史学家的资料，中国古典园林起源于房前屋后的果木蔬圃。园、囿这些文字由象形文字演化而来，外围的方框表示一定的边界或墙垣，方框内则表示栽培植物或蓄养动物。而在西方，景观设计师也主要来源农场主、牧场主。可以说，生产是景观的最早的功能。在中国，五、六十年代也曾出现过"园林结合生产"的运动。而在当今快速的城市化之下，大量的农田被蚕食，残存在城市中的农业也一度被认为是阻碍城市发展的隐患。当景观的生产性功能再一次被强调，为了避免重蹈历史的错误，我们应该以怎样的态度来看待生产性景观呢？

“在所有这些不确定的张力之中，北京并没有像墨西哥城、布宜诺斯艾利斯，或者南亚的诸多大城市那样，陷入某种发展的恐慌与无序。相反，北京的城市发展一直有着某种确定的未来——这个希望就是2008年奥运会。至少在眼下，一切都以此为临界点来运作，包括旧城改造、新项目的核准、政治与经济的运行指标……北京正在患上难以医治的2008临界症，仿佛把城市的未来仅仅设定在这个‘可见的节庆’，真正的未来被放逐了，‘漂浮’了。”

The world's tallest skyscraper will open soon in Dubai, even as the emirate continues to be battered by the financial crisis. Is Burj Dubai an expression of failed megalomania or proof of Dubai leader Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum's stunning vision?The view is clear, the air is soft and silky, and only a thick strip of red separates the sky and the sea at sundown. The boundary between grandeur and kitsch becomes blurred here, halfway up the Burj Dubai, the world's tallest tower.It smells of paint, varnish and new leather, and the steps of female visitors on parquet and marble produce an elegant-sounding echo that suddenly disappears when they step onto soft carpets. An artificial island in the shape of a palm tree is visible to the southwest, and farther to the north is a man-made archipelago that looks like a map of the world.But only the furniture, the carpets, the smells and the sounds are real. The rest is an illusion. The visitor isn't gazing out at the Persian Gulf from 400 meters (1,312 feet) up in the air; in fact, he or she is standing at ground level -- in a model apartment with an enormous mural stretched outside its floor-to-ceiling windows -- at the foot of a hermetically sealed building.The model apartment is located at the recently closed sales office of Emaar Properties, the real estate development company behind the Burj Dubai, which has over-extended itself -- with projects from India to Morocco -- and is now selling some of its condominiums at half the list price. After falling by 32 percent in last two weeks, Emaar's stock price gained 15 percentage points again last Thursday. Emaar, like the entire city, is on the brink of ruin, and yet it behaves as if nothing has happened.Dubai, like no other place in the world, epitomizes globalization, "innovation" and "astonishing progress," as US President Barack Obama said admiringly in his speech to the Muslim world in Cairo in June. But it also stands for mind-boggling excess. In Dubai, utopias almost feel real sometimes, and reality is sometimes nothing but a mirage.The tower, at any rate, is real. With its 160 habitable stories, it juts 818 meters (2,683 feet) into the sky. Tourists have to kneel down on the sidewalk to photograph the building in its entirety, from base to tip.The Burj Dubai is so tall that Bedouins can see it from their oases 100 kilometers (63 miles) inland and sailors can see it from their supertankers, 50 nautical miles out in the Gulf -- at least on the few winter days when the air is as clear as it's portrayed on the mural in front of the model apartment window.The tower is so enormous that the air temperature at the top is up to 8 degrees Celsius (14 degrees Fahrenheit) lower than at the base. If anyone ever hit upon the idea of opening a door at the top and a door at the bottom, as well as the airlocks in between, a storm would rush through the air-conditioned building that would destroy most everything in its wake, except perhaps the heavy marble tiles in the luxury apartments. The phenomenon is called the "chimney effect."AN ARMY OF IMMIGRANT WORKERSAn army of immigrant workers from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, who make up about two-thirds of Dubai's residents, built the Burj. Only one in five residents is considered a "local" entitled to a United Arab Emirates passport. Scores of marketing strategists take steps to ensure that no one scrapes away at the silver varnish of this architectural marvel.Security guards quickly remind anyone who comes too close to the construction site of the meaning of the word "unauthorized." Those who are invited to tour the building, or even just the grounds, are required to sign a non-disclosure agreement, the terms of which are to be obey "finally, irrevocably and unconditionally." Anyone who violates the terms can expect to face a judge in Dubai.All of this will apply for only a little more than two weeks, until Jan. 4, 2010, the official opening date -- already rescheduled several times -- when the developers hope that the tower will begin serving its purpose as a magnet for a two-square-kilometer new development zone, where the wind was still blowing empty plastic bags across the desert sand only five years ago. And when the Burj Dubai opens, it will likely be one of the last major projects for some time in a city that has risen to dizzying heights and now faces the prospect of a precipitous fall.On a single day, Tuesday of last week, prices on Dubai's stock exchange fell by an average of 6 percent. The Islamic bond issued by real estate developer Nakheel fell to 52 cents a share, at a face value of $1 per share. The rating agency Moody's downgraded six other government-related firms to junk status. Hardly anyone believes that Dubai World, the largest of these companies, will be able to refinance its $26 billion debt within six months, as originally scheduled. The US bank Morgan Stanley predicts another drastic increase in the debt restructuring needs of Dubai's government-related firms to double the current level, or about $47 billion."Within a year, Dubai went from being the best-performing real estate market to one of the world's worst," writes the International Herald Tribune. Has the Persian Gulf emirate, once praised for its seemingly dazzling future, bitten off more than it can chew? Is the role model for a future-oriented Arabian Peninsula, with aspirations to become a hub of globalization between the East and the West, nothing less than a model for the future -- a failure?Ironically, it was the Wall Street Journal, standard-bearer of the West's brand of conservative capitalism, that warned against American and European arrogance and the tendency to write off the upstarts in the Gulf region and in the Third World in general. "The old centers ... view the Dubais, the Shanghais and the Rios with suspicion and with errant conviction that their models are built on foundations of sand, ready to collapse, when it was their own foundations that have proved to be weak," the paper writes. "Judging from the misguided reaction to Dubai's challenges, the past year hasn't changed those attitudes. That should make us worried, very worried, but not about Dubai."It is too early to sound the death bell for Dubai. That, at least, is the impression the sheikhs will try to make when they open the Burj Dubai in early January.A SUPREMELY ELEGANT EDIFICEStill, it would be condescending to dispute that the tower is an impressive, supremely elegant edifice, or that it is nothing less than graceful compared with the plain, cuboids from the age of functionalism or the gaudy, modern towers in places like Kuala Lumpur and Taipei.According to the tower's US architect, Adrian Smith, the floor plan, a central core surrounded by three lobes, is patterned on the blossom structure of the Hymenocallis flower, a shape that simultaneously creates more visible surface area and reduces the wind pressure acting on buildings this tall. As it tapers upward, one of the three lobes is shifted slightly backward about every eight floors, an effect that is reminiscent of an Islamic spiral minaret and provides the tower with 26 terraces. There will be an outdoor pool on one of the terraces, on the 78th floor, and the 124th floor (at 442 meters, or 1,450 feet, above sea level) will feature the world's third-highest observation deck.Uwe Hinrichs, 68, a native of the northern German city of Bremen, had already been involved in the construction of another Dubai landmark, the sail-shaped Burj-al-Arab Hotel, when he arrived on the construction site of his life in late 2004. The concrete foundation had already been poured, on top of 850 piles, driven up to 55 meters into the desert floor to support a load of 230,000 cubic meters of concrete and 31,000 tons of steel."From a construction standpoint," says Hinrichs, "the Burj Dubai is a relatively simple structure." One of the biggest challenges, according to Hinrichs, was the logistics of the project, an around-the-clock effort that lasted five years -- five years during which people, machines and material always had to be in the right place at the right time, 24 hours a day. Coordinating the whole thing was Hinrichs' job. His levelheaded northern German disposition proved advantageous in his position as chief coordinator, as did the fact that the people he reported to had no objection to the fact that he occassionally leaves Dubai to attend a concert in Vienna or a Rembrandt exhibition in Muscat in the neighboring country of Oman.PART 2: BAILOUTS FROM ABU DHABIIn 2004, a crew of about 2,000 people began building one floor at a time, completing an average of one per week. When interior construction entered its final phase in the fall of 2009, there were 14,000 people working on the project, people from 45 nations, speaking 35 different languages -- engineers in white helmets, security personnel in red helmets and laborers in blue helmets -- and yet there was no Babylonian linguistic confusion on the site. The workers completed a total of 95 million working hours, many at starvation wages. A skilled carpenter earned no more than €12 a day, while ordinary laborers made even less.Façade components were shipped from China, marble panels from Italy and veneers from Brazil. German companies were also involved in Burj Dubai's construction: Lopark, from the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia, supplied parquet flooring, entire football fields of it. The German branch of the US firm Guardian, based in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, provided 174,000 square meters (1.8 million square feet) of solar glass. Dorma, from Ennepetal in North Rhine-Westphalia, supplied hinges and fittings. Duravit provided approximately 4,000 bidets and toilets. And Miele delivered 7,650 household appliances -- the biggest single order in the company's history. Designer Giorgio Armani bought 15,200 plates and cups from Bavarian porcelain maker Rosenthal for his hotel on the first eight floors of the building.German companies also played important roles in the development and processing of the basic core material of the Burj Dubai: concrete. Because concrete dries too quickly at daytime temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit), the concrete was poured at night. German chemical giant BASF developed a special chemical to make the concrete more malleable initially and later rigid. Putzmeister, a maker of concrete pumps near Stuttgart, provided special high-performance pumps to pump the concrete up to the 160th floor.Quietly and uneventfully, which was entirely to Hinrichs' liking, the tower grew, floor after floor -- until June 6, 2007, when the weather service at the airport e-mailed Hinrichs a satellite image showing a cyclone that had developed over the Indian Ocean, the biggest storm ever recorded in the region, which was heading directly for the Strait of Hormuz. "That was the only day in five years," says Hinrichs, "when we had to close the construction site."The Dubai tower had already surpassed all superlatives in building history. It had overtaken the 509-meter Taipei 101 Tower as the tallest inhabited building in the world, as well as Toronto's 553-meter CN Tower as the tallest freestanding structure. Dubai had arrived at what had become the most ambitious of its goals. The city, a village of pearl divers only a generation earlier, had brought a world record back to the Middle East. For almost four millennia, the Great Pyramid of Giza (138.8 meters) was the world's tallest man-made structure, before it was overtaken by Lincoln Cathedral in England (160 meters, at the time) in 1311.TREMORSWhat could now unhinge this economic miracle on the Gulf? A terrorist attack? A new Gulf war, this time against Iran? Another earthquake, even stronger than the one that hit the region on Sept. 10, 2008?On the day of the cyclone on Sept. 10, 2008, a crane operator working 700 meters above the ground had called Hinrichs to report that it was "shaking" where he was standing. Tremors had shaken the Iranian port city of Bandar Abbas, but in Dubai, few (other than the crane operator) had even noticed.Five days later, Dubai was struck by another sort of tremor, but this one had its epicenter in New York, another city of skyscrapers. On Sept. 15, 2008, Lehman Brothers, the world's fourth-largest investment bank, filed for bankruptcy.Not just Dubai, but the West, too, had been building a tower in the years of the real estate boom, a tower of debt, which now came crashing down. But despite the vast sums of money involved in the crisis in the West, it was and largely remains a strangely abstract phenomenon. Not so in Dubai, however, which reflects the financial debacle more vividly than any other city in the world."Classic megalomania seems to have migrated from people's minds to the system itself. Nowadays the system is crazier than the people," says German philosopher Peter Sloterdijk. "That's why we, as human beings, are terribly disappointed by the course of the crisis. There was not a single colorful individual (in Europe) to make the crisis more interesting. I've never seen such an enormous conspiracy of petty bourgeoise people than at the moment."Sloterdijk may be right when it comes to the bankers, analysts and finance ministers of the West. But he apparently has never heard of Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, 60, a horse breeder and poet, a lover of fast powerful cars, an avid falconer and a juggler of billions. Maktoum is the ruler of Dubai and the prime minister of the United Arab Emirates. "Many leaders make promises," he said in February 2008, when the Free University of Berlin awarded him its medal of honor, "but we deliver."Maktoum had artificial islands built in the waters off his city, with names like The Palm, The World and The Universe. Not just the Free University, but the entire West was fascinated by his energy and optimism. Like the thoroughbred horses in his racing stable, he sent the most capable of his lieutenants into the orbit of globalization, and along the way they built new towers, bought ports and sent airliners out into the world.'CRISIS? WHAT CRISIS?'One real estate company after the next was founded -- Dubai Holding, Dubai Properties, Tatweer, Meraas, Sama -- and it soon became difficult to keep track of who was building what and with whose money. Apparently not even the sheikh himself was always in the know.Only about a year ago, investors were still crowding into the "CityScape Dubai" real estate convention. Former race-car driver Michael Schumacher was there, touting a skyscraper with a covered yacht berth. Nakheel, which is now in very dire financial straits, was seriously talking about the possibility of building a 1,000-meter tower. And, on the palm-shaped Jumeirah island, Dubai spent $20 million on fireworks to celebrate the opening of the fairytale Atlantis Hotel. "Crisis?" the city seemed to ask, "what crisis?"A year few weeks later, one of Sheikh Mohammed's officials presented the bill: Dubai had amassed $80 billion in debt, $50 billion of which, or about two-thirds of its gross domestic product, was scheduled to mature by 2013.For a few days, the sheikh suddenly disappeared from the scene. Rumors emerged he was ill and that he was "melancholy." Then he reappeared and began to whitewash the situation, claiming that the crisis had not affected Dubai, that Dubai had actually overcome the crisis, and that Dubai and its wealthy neighbor, Abu Dhabi, were as close and inseparable as brothers.But the "brothers" from the neighboring sheikdom, with whom the Dubaians form the bulk of the United Arab Emirates, no longer wanted any part of Dubai's excesses. Abu Dhabi has 7 percent of worldwide oil reserves, and its 64-year-old emir, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, is the president of the UAE, while Dubai's Sheikh Mohammed is only its premier -- and Abu Dhabi now views the prestigious activities of his relative in the neighboring emirate with growing mistrust, and probably some envy.At the beginning of the year, Abu Dhabi rescued Dubai from the worst of its problems with a $20 billion cash injection. The emirate stepped in again earlier this week, providing Dubai with an additional $10 billion in financial aid. The emirate may have abundant assets in its $500 billion sovereign wealth fund, but how much longer will it be willing to bailout its neighbor? The sheikhs of Abu Dhabi seem to prefer to spend their money on sounder, more sustainable projects, such as an emissions-free eco-city called Masdar, where the emirate plans to conduct research on projects for the post-petroleum age.In the last four weeks, the sheikh has revealed -- not always voluntarily -- how serious the crisis is and how deeply it affects him. At first, the normally restrained sheikh lost his composure and told the critical Western media to "shut up," and then he dismissed three of his closest advisers on the emirate's central financial council. A short time later, he waxed poetic when he described the crisis as "the fruit-bearing tree that becomes the target of stone-throwers."PART 3: A SYMBOL OF EARTHLY TEMPTATIONIn truth, Sheikh Mohammed, the poet-prince, has good reasons to look forward to the day when the Burj Dubai opens its doors. With one snip of the red ribbon, he will be taking up the thread of a great epic, a saga of humanity that goes well beyond the financial problems of a debt-ridden Gulf emirate. Once before, the Eastern World is said to have been the home another groundbreaking tower, in Babylon, the legendary Mesopotamian city between the Tigris and the Euphrates.Archeologists have confirmed that the Tower of Babel did indeed exist in the 3rd century B.C. They estimate that the skyscraper of antiquity was 90 meters tall, a marvel of the day, and was constructed on a platform that was 90 meters square. If this were true, the tower would have been one-ninth as tall as the latest wonder of the modern world. According to the Bible, the Tower of Babel was much more than a building, but rather a symbol of earthly temptation. "Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves." These words, which sound strikingly like a motto of today's rulers of Dubai, are in fact from the Book of Genesis in the Old Testament. Even today, many of the faithful believe that endeavoring to be like God is a presumption that must invariably lead to punishment.MEGALOMANIA OR A GRAND ACHIEVEMENT?Nevertheless, the excessive building of cities and towers seems to be a cross-cultural constant, a dream and nightmare alike for mankind, from the Babylonians to the heroes and villains of the present. The ruler of Dubai isn't the only one who has carried out his plans in reinforced concrete and gleaming facades.President Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan had Astana, an entire city of monumental avenues, triumphal arches and pyramids built as his new capital, where marble contrasts with granite, buildings are topped by gigantic glass domes and, on the Bayterek Tower, every subject can place his or her hand in a golden imprint of the president's hand.In the Burmese jungle, dictatorial generals had an absurd new capital, Naypyidaw, or "Seat of the Kings," conjured up out of nothing. Yamoussoukro, the capital of Côte d'Ivoire and a memorial to the country's now-deceased first president, Félix Houphouët-Boigny, is even a step closer to the brink. The city is filled with grandiose buildings, but there are hardly any people to be seen. The Basilica of Notre Dame de la Paix is a piece of lunacy inspired by the Basilica of St. Peter in the Vatican, but the African church is even bigger than St. Peter's. Indeed, it is the world's largest Catholic church.It is easy to ridicule the megalomaniacs and their hubris and to rail against the record-breaking mania reflected in their ostentatious buildings, phallic symbols of the rise to power of nouveau-riche potentates.And yet, aren't Brasilia and Canberra, the South American and Australian versions of the man-made model city, remarkable successes? Hasn't history proven at least a few visionaries right, people whose achievements we continue to marvel at today: the creators of Giza on the Nile, Machu Picchu in the Andes and Angkor in Cambodia, or the planners of St. Petersburg?Today, the pyramids of the pharaohs, the mountain fortress of the Incas and the sacral ruins of the Khmer are admired as part of the world's cultural heritage, places that attest to man's greatness. They are the great and magnificent achievements of past eras. Nowadays, the center of St. Petersburg -- designed on the drawing board, like Dubai today, more than 300 years ago -- is still considered an ideal city and an example of successful urban planning.Where the emirates are built on sand, the banks of the Neva River were once swampland. At the behest of the czar, St. Petersburg was not just created as Russia's window to the West, but as a reflection of what the modernists of the day defined as utopian. "Now, city of Peter, stand thou fast, Foursquare, like Russia; vaunt thy splendor! The very element shall surrender And make her peace with thee at last," Alexander Pushkin, the congenial poetic counterpart to Peter the Great, wrote in his poem "The Bronze Horseman." It was pure hubris, cast in the form of magnificent verse.What happens today in Dubai -- or in Shanghai or Astana -- generally happens under the conditions of an authoritarian form of government. In democracies, people cannot be dispossessed and driven off their property but, instead, can hire attorneys to assert their rights. In democracies, more or less reasonable building codes and ordinances, as well as licensed appraisers, ensure that uncontrolled growth and injustices are kept in check. But this limiting effect also applies to creativity, spontaneity and "positive" megalomania, resulting in a general leveling of things.THE VIRTUE OF TAKING THE PLUNGE"This society is mediocre," the poet and sharp-tongued contemporary critic Hans Magnus Enzensberger once wrote about German reality. "Its political leaders and its works of art are mediocre, as are its representatives and its taste, its joys, its opinions, its architecture, its media, its fears, vices and afflictions." And then, in his essay "Mediocrity and Delusion," Enzensberger writes: "There is something cathartic about this realization."Somewhere between Western suburbs and Yamoussoukro lies Dubai. Whether its Burj, its tower, will ever become a part of the world's cultural heritage is still open, as is the question of how long it will remain the world's tallest structure. China, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are already planning towers that will be much taller than the Burj Dubai, reaching more than 1,000 meters into the sky.In the Book of Isaiah, the Bible describes the fall of Babel as follows: "And suddenly your downfall will come, and it will come unexpectedly." If the words of the Old Testament are to be believed, the megalomaniacal tower builders of today cannot expect external support: "Thus shall they be unto thee with whom thou hast labored, even thy merchants, from thy youth: They shall wander every one to his quarter; none shall save thee."The Burj Dubai was not cheap, and perhaps it was even unaffordable. But at least the sheikhs of Dubai have taught their contemporaries one virtue: the virtue of taking the plunge.

“从100米高空拍下杭州，只见毫无规划、杂乱的建筑，水泥丛林，到处都是覆盖物，看不到一块完整的土地。哪里能看出是杭州？哪里还像人间天堂，简直像地狱！”

2009年3月17日，蔡国强来到欧洲另外一个航海强国西班牙的著名港口城市毕尔堡，那个远远驶来的东方人的身影，现在已经成为毕尔堡古根海姆博物馆（Guggenheim Bilbao）盛大回顾展的主角。这是他的全球回顾展在纽约、北京之后的第三站，也是最后一站的展览。

李伯斯金，设计了柏林的犹太博物馆，纽约的ground zero，最近设计德累斯顿的军事历史博物馆（将于2011年10月14日开幕）。建筑与历史记忆的关系是怎样在他的作品中体现出来的？他又怎样理解德累斯顿这个在二战中被盟军炸弹摧毁的城市？

“批判的地域主义持一种辩证和批判的态度。它对以全球化和大同文化为主导的现代主义建筑持强烈的批评态度，它也对地方和地域主义，尤其是那种矫情的、浪漫风的和风景化的地域主义持批评态度。它强调场址、地点和地形、地貌在建筑设计中的作用，它也保持了现代建筑的进步和解放的思想。这是一种严肃的、具有生命力的、进行自我反思和批判的建筑思想。”

60年代，日本的城市环境十分恶劣，有明显的污染和噪声。当时，城市是为经济而存在，而不是为人而存在的。所以，当时的闭合、封闭的自我天地成为我体现自我存在意义的方式，当然，这是一种简化的比喻。而之后，日本的城市有了变化，越来越多的花园、美术馆，城市变得越来越宜人。所以在建筑上，也有了开放的可能。

川震后我们在汶川银杏乡看到这样的情况：近几年盖的房子全倒，但传统穿斗式的房子连屋瓦都没掉。现代的聪明人到底做了什么事？这全都是我们认为老百姓可以自己解决的事情，我们的现代化到底出了什么问题？建筑专业者不参与其事有可能吗？

中国式媚俗的另一个表现形式是其"前卫艺术"的媚俗性。中国至今其实还没有产生真正意义上的"前卫艺术"。中国的所谓"前卫"艺术的制造者还是更多的把它们的作品看成是针对标榜前卫艺术消费者的商品而投其所好。

长年生活工作在一个地方究竟会不会成为真正的限制？

很多情况下，包工头自己也是一个工资和利润被拖欠的对象。在现代包工体制下，管理责任下放到包工头一级的做法将建筑工人推入了一种被遮蔽的劳资关系中。一方面，传统的社会关系，为劳资关系盖上了一层温情脉脉的面纱，一定程度上消解了工人的反抗；另一方面，遮蔽了的劳资关系像一剂慢性毒药，在资本贪婪的追求剩余价值的过程中，不断腐蚀并破坏传统的社会信任体系。