Imprinting Strategic Alliances Into Space Bangkok, Thailand

2555/2012 Fieldtrip report MSc Building and Urban Design in Development Development Planning Unit University College London
Imprinting strategic alliances into space Bangkok, Thailand
2555/2012 Fieldtrip report MSc Building and Urban Design in Development Development Planning Unit University College London
Imprinting strategic alliances into space Bangkok, Thailand
Who we are
PAGE 02 | Who we are
Acknowledgements
This report forms the culmination of a journey of learning and understanding that, although based in Bangkok, begins and ends in London, at UCL. Thank you to all the staff at the Development Planning Unit, in particular Camillo Boano, William Hunter, Anna Schulenburg, Ruth McLeod, Cassidy Johnson, Barbara Lipietz, Ben Leclair, Caren Levy and Andrew Wade for their support, expertise and advice. The journey wouldnt have been complete for the students of BUDD without our travelling partners, the students of UDP, whose opinions, observations and friendship made it an interesting and entertaining one. We would like to sincerely thank the following people whose patience, hospitality and generosity was indispensable for the production of this report, that wouldnt have been realised without their determination and hard work. Thank you all... All staff at CODI, ACHR, the National Housing Authority of Thailand, Crown Property Bureau, ACCA, Kitti Patpongpiboon (Housing Finance Association), LPN Development Public Company Ltd, Praying Posriprasert (Arsomsilp), Sakkarin Sapu (Mahasarakham University), Chawanad Luansang (Openspace), Supawut Boonmahathanakorn (ACHR), Dr. Nattawut Usavagovitwong, Dr. Wijitbusaba Ann Marome, and all the local government agencies, community architects, Thai architecture students, local coordinators, UCL Alumni and of course, the translators we worked with that made our infield experience possible. There are so many people that helped us along the way, such as JL Hotel Bangkok and our endlessly patient bus and van drivers. We wish we could thank you all individually. Special thanks to the community leaders, and community members from Chatuchak, Wangthonglang, Nonthaburi, Bang Prong, Bangkholeam and Pattaya; and, of course to Somsook Boonyabancha for her never ending inspirational insight, energy and vision which helped all of us: Its not if things have changed, but how things have changed thats important.
Acknowledgements | PAGE 03
Table of Content
How to read this report Executive summary Introduction and context 1. Vision 1.1 What is transformation? 1.2 Scaling up reconfigured 1.3 Printmaking the city: strategic alliances shaping the space 2. Methodologies and sites 2.1 Actor mapping 2.2 On the sites Site 1: Chatuchak Site 2: Wang Thonglang Site 3: Bang Kho Laem Site 4: Pattaya Site 5: Bang Prong Site 6: Nonthaburi 3. Findings & analysis 4. Strategies: imprinting strategic alliances into space Conclusion Bibliography List of figures Appendices A1. Methodologies A2. Issues site by site A3. Site diary A4. Attended seminars 05 06 09 13 14 18 19 21 22 24 26 30 34 38 42 46 51 59 73 76 78 83 84 98 104 122
Acronyms
ACHR BEA BKK BM BMA BMR BUDD CBO CDF CODI CPB DPU GHB NGO NHA NULICO UCL UCDO UDP Asian Coalition for Housing Rights Baan Eur Arthorn Housing Program Bangkok Baan Mankong Bangkok Metropolitan Administration Bangkok Metropolitan Region Building and Urban Design in Development Community Based Organisation Community Development Fund Community Organisations Development Institute Crown Property Bureau Development Planning Unit Government Housing Bank Non-Governmental Organisation National Housing Authority National Union of Low Income Community Organisations University College London Urban Community Development Office Urban Development Planning
PAGE 04 | Table of contents
How to read this report

Initial clarification: What is printmaking?
Printmaking is different than printing. To print means to produce () in large quantities, by a mechanical process (Oxford dictionary, 2012). Printmaking, in contrast, means that each piece produced is an original and not a copy, it is an impression and not a reproduction of another work of art (MOMA, no date). For printmakers, the art is to master the process of production, and how separate layers produced independently to work together as a whole. Printmaking implies choose the qualities of each impression in the printmaking processes. Printmaking is not stamp, but translated into a physical outcome with a unique set of qualities.
General definitions
SITE By Site we refer to the set of communities visited during the fieldtrip in Bangkok. We visited 6 different sites in Bangkok with groups of combined BUDD and UDP students. One or two members of our report group visited each site. COMMUNITY We refer to community as the group of households sharing a physical location and organized as a unified entity. Thailand government defines a territorial unit called "chumchon", that is an institutional definition for community. TRANSFORMATION WHEEL As Transformation Wheel we refer to the graphical tool used on the process of research. This tool and subsequent variations of it are used in several sections of the report. It has basically two versions: an analytical tool about transformation in four dimensions (see Figure 10 in page 16); and an actor mapping that shows time and events (see Figure 11 and 15, 16 and 17). DIMENSIONS We refer to Dimensions as the four components of the transformation wheel: political, economic, spatial and cultural.
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How to read this report | PAGE 05
Executive summary
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This report has been produced by BUDD students of DPU, University College London, as a result of a four month process of review, both in London and a fieldtrip in Bangkok for 15 days in April and May of 2012. The main objectives of the report are: - To define and discuss the definition of transformation and scale. - To analyze the Baan Mankong programme and its transformative potential and methods of scaling up. - To describe the process of learning during the fieldtrip work. - To recognize the main opportunities and obstacles of the programme as a transformative process, and to propose strategies based on those opportunities.
In the next pages you will find a report organized in the following sections: Vision - Transformation is defined as a collaborative and episodic process of institutional and distributional change towards political, economic, spatial and cultural justice. This definition is explained through an analysis of the key concepts that compose it. - The concept of scaling up is reconfigured and expanded through the concepts of scaling up, on, accross, in and out. - We present printmaking as a general lens through which we framed our analysis and strategies, addressing the question how can we design processes to imprint strategic alliances into the city physical and social fabric?
Methodologies and sites According to our definition of transformation, a set of pre-fieldtrip actor mapping methods are presented. In order to translate this approach into the site, a set of criteria is explained. Each site is presented through an explanation of key learnings, two maps of actor and process, and a deconstruction of the sites according to our defined criteria, illustrated through both physical and actor maps.
Findings The findings of the overview of the sites are presented as opportunities for the programme, identifying the main obstacles that hinder them.
PAGE 06 | Executive summary
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These opportunities are the potential of design; communal spaces; land as a resource; cycle of upgrading; diversification of saving groups; diversification of funding sources; inclusion; multiplicity of stakeholders; precedent setting; transparency; fragmentation; and ethics of State institutions. Strategies Each strategy is presented with a set of actions and a discussion about its implications on imprinting networks into space. - Design as praxis: design professionals and CODI can play a wider role to incorporate processes of innovation, through both reflection and practice. - Alternative responses to land pressures: envisioning alternative urban interventions to offer
increased options in terms of housing and density that are more responsive to land constraints and urban pressures. - Sustaining momentum and collectivity: sustaining the momentum created through the process, in order to maintain the political mobilisation and social capital and to unleash the transformative potential of the programme. - Shaping the city beyond Baan Mankong: unearth the processes of upgrading and change that are taking part in Bangkok beyond the BM programme, and include the rest of society in the transformative drive towards an inclusive city. Story boxes Throughout the report, boxes containing personal stories collected across the six sites will comple-
ment the analysis. The aim is to ground the report into the real lives of people we met and worked with, that is, what we are ultimately writing about. Conclusion Finally, we outline the main conceptualization we drew from our analysis of Baan Mankong, and the strategies we devised to scale up, recognizing that it is necessary to bridge the gap between the community and the institutional scale by amplifiying strategic alliances at the intermediate level.
Executive summary| PAGE 07
Introduction and context
Introduction & context

INTRODUCTION
This report is the result of a 4 months process of MSc BUDD students at DPU, UCL, with the aim to understand the socio-political and spatial complexities of the Baan Mangkong housing programme in the city of Bangkok, Thailand. The process was framed in the context of the "Building and Urban Design in Practice" module of the MSc, and was divided into three different phases: pre-field, field, and post-field. Pre-field consisted of 3 months spent in London attending seminars and research to develop a theoretical background of the programme. This was followed by a two weeks field trip to study the Baan Mankong program on the ground hosted by CODI, engaging directly with a wide range of key stakeholders in and around Bangkok; and finally two weeks in London bringing everything together to produce this report. The report begins with our own definition of social transformation, concepts of scaling-up and a set of criteria designed to assess the transformative potential of the BM programme. Our definition recognises both the criticality of collaboration in achieving social transformation, as well as identifying different dimensions of change we feel are needed to achieve a more just society. To be able to assess whether or not social transformation is happening via BM we produced a tool to map where and how collaboration is happening in regards to different dimensions of justice. We used this tool to map relations at the scale of the programme and the communities to unpack the complexity of collaboration. Finally, framed by the opportunities and obstacles we see facing the BM programme in achieving social transformation at scale, we propose strategies. Introducing the concept of printmaking, that is to say imprinting networks into space, our strategies works to amplify strategic alliances at the intermediate level in order to bridge the gap between the community and the institutional scale for greater collaboration. and generates 54% of Thailands public revenues. It is also a major regional hub and has been classified as an Alpha- World City, whose economic interests extend well beyond national boundaries. Webster and Maneepong (2009) refer to Bangkok as a global actor in a misaligned national governance framework. The centralised nature of Thai political system means that the influence of local authorities is limited, since decision making is concentrated in Governments hands. However, Bangkoks influencial role is not reflected in the Government, which is often elected with votes from the rural population. The political focus on agrarian and rural issues takes the emphasis away from the problems of the urban environment. Indeed, urban planning has never been a priority in the Governments agenda: Bangkoks first Metropolitan Plan was only drawn up twenty years ago. Although the citys population growth rate slowed down in recent years, the number of residents in the urban conglomeration is increasing fast. This process leads to uncontrolled urban sprawl, incorporating the five bordering provinces into the body of the metropolis. As concrete takes over Bangkoks marshy outskirts, serious environmental problems arise, the main one being flooding. The city lies in a flood-prone area, and in 2011 it experienced the worst flooding in decades. Landowners in Bangkok can roughly be divided into public and private, with the State responsible for the majority of public land. State authorities date landowning rights back to the feudal system. The main public landowners are the Crown Property
BANGKOK: the eternal jewel city

According to Bangkok Metropolitan Authority website, the complete name of Bangkok is listed in the Book of World Records as the longest name of a place. Translated into English, it would sound like The city of angels, the great city, the eternal jewel city, the impregnable city of God Indra, the grand capital of the world endowed with nine precious gems, the happy city, abounding in an enormous royal palace that resembles the heavenly abode where reigns the reincarnated God, a city given by Indra and built by Vihnukarn. This name might not portray Bangkok faithfully, yet in some way reflects this hyperbolic metropolis of humongous infrastructures, kitsch skyscrapers and teeming alleys. The capital city of Thailand is the political, cultural and economic centre of the country; with around 15 million people in its metropolitan region, it accounts for half of the countrys urban population
PAGE 10 | Introduction and context
Bureau (CPB) and the Treasury Department, but there are other institutions such as the State Railway, the Port Authority and temples that own large proportions of land and have important roles in localized cases. Private landowners are common, and have legal rights to prevent people from squatting or developing housing on their land. Illegal settlements are most common on State owned land, and public landowners are playing a crucial role in the land negotiation process. In this context of speculation driven urban growth and pressure over land increases, social inequalities intensify and acces to secure housing becames a significant challenge. In order to manage the urban poor housing question, in 2003, Prime Minister Thaksin launched his One Million Houses programme. It comprised of two parallel low-
income housing programmes: Baan Eua-Arthorn (We Care Housing), and Baan Mankong (Secure Housing). The later has been our entry point into the study of Bangkok. The first one has a supply-driven approach and is conducted by the National Housing Authority, it targets low income families with a maximum income threshold and concentrates on individual ownership of property. Baan Mankong, managed by the Community Organisation Development Institute, is instead demand-driven and has mandate of collective ownership. The NHA designs, builds and sells subsidized housing units to the poor, whereas Baan Mankong encourages urban poor themselves to plan, manage and implement their own housing and settlements. It does so by providing them flexible financial
support for community-led construction and land tenure. People need to be registered as a collective Community Cooperatives, prove organization as well as other conditions in order to access loans at State subsidized rate. Somsook Boonyabancha, former CODI director and now ACHR Secretary General, explains this focus on collectivity and saving groups contending that urban poor are weak as individuals, but strong together. Individualization brings weakness, whereas savings bring people together, build trust and management skills: If people can manage finance collectively, it means that they have the power and independence to do anything (2012). This vision has strong implications in the way Baan Mankong contributes to rearticulate social networks and space in the city.
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Introduction and context | PAGE 11
1. Vision
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PAGE 14 | Vision
1. Vision
...Politics is the art of the possible: authentic politics is, the exact opposite, that is, the art of the impossible it changes the very parameters of what is considered possible in the existing constellation (Ziek, 2000).
Freedom, [...] is the capacity to participate effectively in shaping the social limits that define what is possible (Hayward, 1998). In this sense, participation as freedom is not only the right to participate effectively in a given space, but the right to define and to shape that space (Gaventa, 2006).
1.1 WHAT IS TRANSFORMATION?

Our definition of transformation is based on a number of key concepts and ideas outlined in this section. Together, these concepts compose what we think is necessary to initiate and bring forward a process of radical social transformation. This definition will be the entry point to analyze the Baan Mankong programme and its transformative potential. Social transformation is a collaborative and episodic process of institutional and distributional change towards political, economic, spatial and cultural justice. Collaborative Process Social transformation can only occur as a collaborative change, arising out of continuous interactions between processes of bottom-up mobilization and top-down reform (Figure 10). Any process of transformation needs to deal with the gap between institutional structure and mobilized agency, and cant be successful without the participation of multiple actors, both in terms of individual and collective behaviours. Given the diversity of interests between actors wanting to claim a stake in contested spaces of Bangkok, collaboration will inherently be conflictual. For Miessen (2010) conflict in participation is not violence but rather a micro-political practice through which the participant becomes an active agent who insists on being an actor in the force field they are facing, and a constructive model of antagonistic encounter. A truly just democratic process must incorporate such means of positive intervention (Ibidem). With its Baan Mankong programme, CODI has created a resource ladder allowing the urban poor of Thailand to collectively access low interest loans from a revolving fund for housing upgrading and land tenure. The loan is not handed over, but instead groups of people need to comply with restricted conditions set up by CODI that prove accountability and organizational capacity. CODI can be seen as creating an opportunity for coproduction and relies on the urban poor to activate it.The CODI programme does not itself supply access to land and tenure security instead has to be negotiated for independently by the community with the landowners.As more communities use this
Vision | PAGE 15
TOP-DOWN TRANSFORMATION
COLABORATION SPACE: COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION TRANSFORMATION
opportunity with different land owners, the discrete points of negotiation with similar actors creates patterns of negotiation and gains traction to (re)produce larger arenas of decision making and production. Networks of communities through Baan Mankong have used critical mass to leverage for land tenure and in securing loans. FIGURE 10: Transformation Wheel An empty area lies between the bottom-up (inner ring) and the top-down (outer ring) of the wheel. This area represents where collaboration occurs: a space defined on one side by institutional and distributional reform and on the other by leverage from critical mass. This arena is not finite, but instead produced by interactions. Negotiations emerge and are played out in time, thus collaboration is a process constantly constructed and reconstructed (Levy, 2011). As more communities use this opportunity with different land owners, the discrete points of negotiation with similar actors creates patterns of negotiation and gains traction to (re)produce larger arenas of decision making and production. Networks of communities through Baan Mankong have used critical mass to leverage for land tenure and in securing loans. Episodic process Most of the times, processes of transformation are not linear and do not start from scratch, instead are initiated or catalysed by events that trigger a transformation (Figure 11). Catalytic events occur on all
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BOTTOM-UP TRANSFORMATION
scales, from the governmental threat to dissolve CODI funding, to small scale events such as ceremonies and new leaders. Such moments open new opportunities to reconfigure current organizational patterns, exercise self-determination, strengthen capacity to maintain struggle for social transformation and expand the room for manoeuvre (Safier, 2010). This generates possibilities to challenge deep structural inequalities. Political, Economic, Spatial and Cultural Justice Social transformation radically shifts current uneven relations of production towards political, cultural, economic and spatial justice (see Figure 12). Radical democratic transformation consist of processes and outcomes that challenge existing institutionalised norms and policies. These alternative visions can be produced from positions of marginality, where antagonistic dialogue can be established (Boano and Frediani, 2011). If dialogue is established without contesting existing positions of marginality, there is a great danger that denial is mirrored into conformism (Ibidem). A democratic society must continually (re)present itself as an opportunity to confront ideas and processes of production; the concern is not with the question of agreement, or the preservation of order, but with exactly the opposite, with the intervention of new and hitherto unauthorised modes of dissaggregation, disagreement and disorder (Hallward, 2005, in Swyngedouw, 2007, p. 26). Baan Mankong, beyond making loans accessible to those previously marginalized, is also a process of formalization that
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PAGE 16 | Vision
ag acc en es cy s t ov o la er nd sp & ac e
opens the opportunity to visualise alternative socio-spatial realities (Boonyabancha, 2005). With its strong emphasis on the notions of collectiveness, organization and negociation community as a pre-condition to access the programme, it influences the way people see themselves, as an active agent. Social transformation will manifest as collaborative dialogue in all dimensions political, spatial, cultural and financial activated by the meeting of bottomup mobilization with top-down reform. In an attempt to define a set of criteria to measure transformation based on these four dimensions, we identified what should be the targets both from the bottom-up process and the top-down reform perspectives (See Figure 12). In this light, Political Justice will involve the meeting of effective decentralization and political will with localised leverage to include the urban poor in the vision of the city. In regards to Spatial Justice, a transformation implies territorial equity, meeting with individuals and communities with agency over space. Economic Justice implies financial reforms towards equitable access and control over resources meeting with financial leverage gained by mobilizing self-sufficiency. Cultural Justice entails a process of inclusion, where widespread symbolic recognition meets peoples self-awareness and self-determination.
te r eq rito ui ria ty l
COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION
n f tio el ina s rm te de lic n bonitio m sy cog e r
ss ce ac ce ity ur qu so e re
al ci e an rag fin ve le
ed lis ge ca ra lo ve n le io ive at ct iz fe al ef ntr e sc de
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Vision | PAGE 17
1.2 SCALING-UP RECONFIGURED

If people arent changing, things arent changing. So things change when people change. Upgrading, the way we see it, is a process in which a group of people are changing because they begin to believe in their own power and see that they are not different than all the other citizens in the city. [] If a whole group of people starts believing in their own power, energy and ability this is upgrading. (Boonyabancha, 2005)
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If social transformation is where institutional and distributional reform meets the capacity of the poor, the question of scaling up becomes a question of expanding the arena of discourse itself rather than how to increase institutional reform and capacity of the poor as independent forces. We understand the scaling up of a transformative process as advancement along three axes (Figure 13). Axis one refers to size: in order to scale up, the process needs to involve a wider number of people and actors and to cover larger portions of territory. This coincides with a more conventional understanding of scaling up. The second axis represents time: it refers to the process capacity to reproduce, evolve and sustain itself over time. We will refer to this as scaling on. The third axis is about the magnitude of the process: namely, to which extent it covers the four
PAGE 18 | Vision
dimensions of transformation impacting the lives of people in a more fundamental way beyond upgrading. We will refer to this as scaling across. Clearly, the axes are deeply interrelated, and advancement on one of them influences the others. However, radical social transformation cant be achieved without a comprehensive advancement along these three axes. As previously explained, we believe this can only be achieved within a space of collaboration between bottom-up mobilization and top-down reforms. We will refer to this collaborative process as scaling out and scaling in. Our diagnosis of the sites and our strategies are grounded in this redefinition of the concept of scaling up. In this framework, in order to be truly transformative, Baan Mankong needs to scale-up along these three axes: to reach and include as many people as possible; to trigger a change
capable to sustain and perpetuate itself; and to affect comprehensively the cultural, economical, political and spatial dimensions of society. To scale up, Baan Mankong has to draw in more people. This doesnt imply an institutional expansion, but broadening its social base. Social networks play an important role as critical facilitators and support mechanism in all phases of the upgrading process, from educating people about the program, to finding land to technical and financial advice support. A key point to ensure further success of the programme, is expanding and strengthening these networks, focusing not only on urban poor communities but also bringing in people from different sectors of society. For the programme to scale on, it is crucial to sustain momentum. This notion doesnt designate mere motion, but rather the power residing in a
1.3 PRINT MAKING THE CITY: STRATEGIC ALLIANCES SHAPING THE SPACE
moving entity: indeed, keeping momentum entails furthering empowerment. Generally, Baan Mankong upgrading projects start off from peoples need to obtain secure land tenure and housing. While there are active communities capable of propelling further this initial drive, others rapidly lose momentum after achieving the initial goal and become stagnant (see Sites analysis). How to retain, incentivize and scale on momentum beyond housing, to leverage for deeper change? According to Boonyabancha, the aim of Baan Mankong promoted upgrading goes well beyond granting financial leverage for the poor and physical improvements: it is about peoples lives and rights (Boonyabancha, 2005). In accordance with CODIs ethics, it is important for the ethos of upgrading to comprehensively scale across the four dimensions of transformation if holistic social transformation is a goal. Finally, Baan Mankong brings platforms of negotiation that increase the spaces of collaboration among actors. According to Boonyabancha (2005), the network provides a platform for a single community to have the space to negotiate with the city which single communities cannot often do by themselves. This platform widens the possibilities for coproduction, that lies at the core of any process of scaling out and scaling in. Along this report, we will analyse the Baan Mankong programme through the lenses of the definitions of transformation and scaling up presented. The aim is to find the main opportunities in the Baan Mankong, and propose strategies to make it even more transformative. However, our analysis, opportunities and strategies, will be based on a general understanding of the main contribution that, as design practitioners, we can give. This idea is based on the definition of printmaking presented in page 05. In the centre of Baan Mankong lies the idea of strategic alliances and networks. These alliances and networks can and should be intensified, in the context of the citys and programmes dynamics. Social networks can direct the development of the city, and in turn urban space shapes social relations, in a reciprocal relationship. The question that arises is how this reciprocal nature can be capitalised: how these networks and alliances can be strategically translated into the production of space, and how space can shape and prop them up - or more precisely, how can we design processes to imprint these intensified alliances into the production of city, and to intensify them through the city. With this analogy in mind, and after reviewing the information collected in the field, we are going to address the opportunities found in order to make the programme more transformative (Figure 14).
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Vision | PAGE 19
2. Methodologies and sites
2. Methodologies and sites

2.1 ACTOR MAPPING
In pre-field analysis, after defining transformation and scaling-up, we produced three actor maps, visualising how Baan Mankong functions in socio political climate of Bangkok. In the areas of finance, land and institutions, actors are outlined to asses where we feel the areas of social transformation are occurring in the production of Baan Mankong programme (Figures 15, 16 and 17). The maps incorporate time and the idea of episodic moments (represented in red) with the concept of social transformation as occuring in an arena produced by interaction of institutional reforms and mobilization and organization practices. By placing individuals at the centre and institutions on the outside, the intermediate ring can be understood as a target of collaborative social transformation, and activities positioned on either side to achieving this goal. For instance, both CDFs and CDCs were considered to have socially transformative potential as they incorporate actors from both sides.
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Finance actor map The area of transformation is filled starting from the initiation of savings groups with UCDO to a more interconnected and independents CDFs.
PAGE 22 | Methodologies and sites
Land map Different sites of Baan Mankong are represented showing its relation with landowners and the diversity of events that triggered the processes of upgrading.
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Networks and Institutions actor map CDCs, composed by different linkages across- in out between actors, are highlighted as platforms of negotiation that link institutions with the communities.
Methodologies and sites | PAGE 23
2.2 ON THE SITES

The following section presents an analysis of each site emphasising the socio-spatial relationships. In the field, we used methodologies such as participatory mapping, structured and semi-structured interviews with the help of translators, and the River of Life exercise in which the community tells their story through articulating obstacles and opportunities from the past, present and future. It includes two different types of actor maps, and an interpretive site map. Community-level actor mapping: upgrading process The original intention was to recalibrate the prefield actors maps (Figures 15, 16 and 17) using data from the field, but in visiting each community it became apparent too much important detail would be lost in an amalgamated map. Temporal in nature, the community-level actor map tells the story of each community showing how catalytic moments change the organization, while illustrating how different actors, appear, grow, and disappear at different stages of the upgrading process. Site-level actor mapping: negociation Using the methodology of forces pushing from the inside-out and outside-in, we analysed the spatial dynamics involved in the process of upgrading corresponding to the four dimensions of the wheel. We recognised that the scale of a site is too small to
detect social transformation, therefore appropriated the criteria used in the original wheel of transformation to correspond to more localised site dynamics representing actions that though are not transformative contain the potential of it.Instead of communicating scaling-in of institutional reform and scaling-out of collective capacity it shows the nature of interactions at the level of the sites. What emerges is who drives the negotiations and in which dimension they occur or do not occur.Issues discussed more are represented by overlaps, offering a bigger platform for negotiation, rather than a link which represents minimal interaction 0r a gap representing no interactions. Thus becomes a site-level negotiation tool detecting interaction, CRITERIA original criteria Spatial forces
access to land &
willingness and negotiation which we feel represent strategical alliances. Diagrammatic sites Complementary the information of the site-level negotiation mapping, the diagrammatic site maps are made up of four layers corresponding to our four dimensions of transformation (spatial, political, cultural and financial). In separating the actors and events working and impacting space in each sector it becomes more visible how strategic alliances are being printed in space.
site criteria Economic forces

tactics to negotiate
original criteria inside-out

financial leverage
site criteria
putting together funds, savings groups
inside-out agency over space for land and design outside-in territorial
equity political will to find land for communities & secure tenures concessions by landowners.
outside-in
resource access financial provision of resources equity
original criteria Political forces inside-out localised

leverage effective
site criteria
local mobilization political will to push joining the programme
original criteria Cultural forces inside-out

self determination symbolic recognition
site criteria
solidarity & self-awareness
outside-in descentralization communities into
outside-in
social inclusion
N
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Site 6: Nonthaburi Site 3: Bang Kho Laem Site 5: Bang Prong Site 1: Chatuchak Site 2: Wang Thonglang Site 4: Pattaya
Site 1: Chatuchak
General description
The District is located in a fringe area of Bangkok and most of its 38 communities live along the two canals crossing the area. There is the intention from the Government to widen the canal to solve the flooding issue. Job wise there is a big market and smaller shops. The Treasury Department is the major landowner.
Main learnings
A strong connection exists between the communities along the canal network; the interrelation and information exchange among the communities leaders emerged as effective and fluent. On the other hand a mismanagement in terms of time, information flow and decision making at the community level is hindering a homogenous and coordinated upgrading process. This is happening despite both CODI and the Treasury Departments genuine willingness to pave the way for a smooth implementation of the upgrading. A deep sense of place attachment is present in the communities, as well as the desire to see a stronger attention to public spaces where common activities as well as future visions for the community itself can manifest. In the sites there were challenges to achieving consensus, so CODI proposed breaking the upgrading program into space and time to ease the process, demonstrating its great flexibility. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 98) and A3 (page 104).
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Community-level actor mapping

Lang Witthayalaikru Chankaseam
present
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Chareonchai Nimitmai Community

present
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Figures 20 and 21 show the actor mapping of two communities of this site. They show organization over time, starting from the top and moving to the present in a circular way, highlighting events and actors filling the area of transformation at different moments.
Site-level actor mapping: negociation

Multiple actors have a presence in Chatuchak. Only 2 communities are mobilized and actively engaged in saving for upgrading, while the rest choose not to organize due to limited trust in the program. Financial and organizational support from CODI is counterbalanced by limited community cohesion, and limited momentum and support from landowners.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 24) shows the main actors negotiation in Chatuchak, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 25+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
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Chatuchak: Diagrammatic site
Political
- 2 of 8 communities are active and are currently in the design phase - Pressures exist around the new construction of the Expressway due to potential of eviction. Bann Mankong Chareonchai Nimitmai pilot project is leading the mobilization of the communities affected - Strong leadership is a major characteristic of Chatuchak communities - Communities along the canal havent achieved a consensus to join BM and are waiting for completion of Lang Witthayalaikru Chankaseam community
Political
Economic
-All communities have savings groups but not all households are joining -Communities use different funding to cover community amenities and services, negotiated by the leader. -CODI and Local District have provided funding after the floods. -Flood risk has pushed the communities to start upgrading by themselves and to follow BMA instructions to set back their houses in order to widen the canal. -Communities manage funding as a Canal Network.
Political
Economic
Spatial
- The canal edge defines the morphology of the community as well as its relationship to the city. - Massive infrastructure networks are a key characteristic of the area, pushing up land value and increasing pressure on communities - Completed Chareonchai Nimitmai pilot community facing renewed threat of eviction when they are about to complete land loan repayment following long negotiation process
Political
Economic
Spatial
- The canal edge defines the morphology of the community as well as its relationship to the city. - Massive infrastructure networks are a key characteristic of the area, pushing up land value and increasing pressure on communities - Completed Chareonchai Nimitmai pilot community facing renewed threat of eviction when they are about to complete land loan repayment following long negotiation process
Cultural
- Conflict, disagreements and lack of trust in the programme are widespread within and among communities - The leaders have strong linkages between them but the members themselves are not very involved in the information flow. -Leaders are waiting for one community to start the upgrading so it can be used as an example for the rest of them. -The Canal Network encourages solidarity between communities for flood relief, environmental issues and finance.
Site 2: Wang Thonglang
General description
Land is owned by the Crown Property Bureau, knowledge of their ethics around evictions attracted seven communities to settle on their land within Wangthonglang district. Although the site was at the periphery of metropolitan Bangkok 20 years ago, livelihood opportunities, proximity to key sites and good transport links in the district have led to its dense population. The seven communities are now at different stages of Baan Mankong.
Main learnings
CODI approached the CPB in 2003 at the height of community evictions to introduce Baan Mankong, and now communities are pushed to participate in the programme. CPB land dwellers are organised into groups at district and city level, under what they largely perceive to be an ineffective CPB city-wide taskforce. Despite close proximity of communities, there are limited formal avenues for knowledge sharing, and the communities tactical seeking of funding from local authorities is uncoordinated. While the majority of households participate in savings groups, communities in earlier stages of the BM programme display lower levels of cooperation and interest in future plans. On the other hand, completed pilot communities display a disintegration of savings sub-groups and increasing conflict. Uncertainty of tenure, the exclusion of renters, poor quality of temporary housing and wider concerns of invaders and squatters in the area, all pose key challenges to the BM programme, and raise questions about the possibilities of scaling up the transformational capacities of upgrading when initiated and managed by a powerful landowner. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 99) and A3 (page 107).
f.26

Thepleela Community
present
f.29
f.30
f.27
Kao Pattana Community
present
f.28

The CPB stands as an almost solo and controlling actor on the ground. CODI has limited presence only on account of the MOU with the CPB, which is actively pushing communities to organize and managing the upgrading process. Participation is limited to consultation, and only pockets of consenting households are upgrading and tactically seeking district funding, with limited learning and coordination.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 31) shows the main actors negotiation in Wang Thonglang, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 32+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
f.31
f.32
Wang Thonglang Diagrammatic site
Political
- Crown Property Bureau is a landowner with institutionalised ethics against evictions, the land attracted the 7 communities into Wangthonglang over time - Communities are settled in fragmented pockets across the districts between privately contracted plots of mixed uses, drawn by job opportunities, key sites and good transportation links - Communities are constantly organized to negotiate around land; previously for short term leases and recently within the Baan Mankong program - the CPB is pushing them to join
Political
Economic
- Communities have diversified savings groups depending on communities interest and the stage of BM programme. - Savings groups cover a variety of funds beyond housing, such as economic opportunities, education and welfare - The district council and BMA are supporting organised communities through granting access to the Village Fund and supporting them with infrastructure and services. Such support and funding from multiple actors is uncoordinated.
Political
Economic
Spatial
- The CPB controls development on its land through designating the lease term, the upgrading approach, the design options and construction cost - The communities benefit from security of tenure for 30 years, but genuine participation in the upgrading process is lacking, the development is fragmented, and NULICO and CODI do not appear on the ground. Questions arise about the transformative nature of Baan Mankong when appropriated in this manner
Political
Economic
Spatial
- The CPB controls development on its land through designating the lease term, the upgrading approach, the design options and construction cost - The communities benefit from security of tenure for 30 years, but genuine participation in the upgrading process is lacking, the development is fragmented, and NULICO and CODI do not appear on the ground. Questions arise about the transformative nature of Baan Mankong when appropriated in this manner
Cultural
- Conflict, disagreements and lack of trust in the programme are widespread within and among the 7 Wangthonglang communities - The master plan developed for the 7 communities by CPB will be hindered by increasing income disparities, declining social cohesion and social problems such as drugs. Renters being pushed out with upgrading is a major problem as well.
Site 3: Bang Kho Laem

General description
Bankolaem and Sathorn are two central districts. The three communities studied are in prime-land owned by public entities that have allowed them to stay by leases or selling. The three communities became organized after a fire, and have had to face constrains in terms of density and typology.
Main learnings
The landowners, the Treasury Department in Suanplu and CPB in Lung Talad Kaowat Prayakrai, mainly lead the process in this central area, so CODI has to negotiate with them. The third community visited, Sang Kee, is a 20 years old upgrading project that acts as a precedent for the BM communities in the district. As a central area, the land is a valuable resource that has to be optimized, and the discussion about density and typology is central. Specifically in LTKP, the CPB exerts pressures in terms of typology that have implied a disincentive for organization and distrust within the community. In the case of Suanplu, after the fire the community members chose between joining BM and BEA projects, with more typological flexibility in the second one. The multiplicity of things happening around the communities is contrasted with the fragmentation among the mega-plots that compose them. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 100) and A3 (page 110).
f.33

Suan Plu Community
present
f.36
f.37 f.34
Lung Talad Kao Wat Prayakrai Community
present
f.35

Being on prime, high value land, communities are being pushed by the CPB and leaders to organize, with less pressure from the Treasury Department. The financial organization of upgraded communities, originally triggered by fires, ceased following project implementation. Social cohesion did not result from collectivity, and un-upgraded communities remain without incentive to upgrade.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 38) shows the main actors negotiation in Bang Kho Laem, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 39+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
f.38
f.39
Bang Kho Laem: Diagrammatic site
Political
- Wat Para Yakrai community is settled on CPB land since the 1980s. Due to fires, residents in phase 1, now housed in apartment blocks, were pushed to organise and join the Baan Mankong program. - Due to a common dislike of apartment blocks, residents in remaining phases, under pressure from CPB to organise, are not willing to do so. - Two Suan Plu communities on Treasury Department land pushed to organise following fires. 60% chose the NHA over the BM program for reasons of efficiency. Third community without momentum to join.
Political
Economic
- In Wat Para Yakrai and Suan Plu communities, there is currently no organization with respect to savings groups or basic community finance, either due to lack of momentum or completion of upgrading.
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Due to rising land value in this central area of Bangkok, the CPB is pressuring communities to organise and accept apartment blocks and higher densities to clear land for other uses. - The Treasury Department is less controlling but due to increasing land value might push the un-upgraded Suan Plu community to join.
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Due to rising land value in this central area of Bangkok, the CPB is pressuring communities to organise and accept apartment blocks and higher densities to clear land for other uses. - The Treasury Department is less controlling but due to increasing land value might push the un-upgraded Suan Plu community to join.
Cultural
- Although communities are being pushed to upgrade, they remain excluded by physical barriers from neighbouring high value sites. - Limited cohesion is a marked observation in communities, more considerably in Wat Para Yakrai, and particularly in the community upgraded into apartment blocks.
Site 4: Pattaya
General description
Pattaya is a booming tourist town 2 hours from Bangkok on the coast presenting incredible land speculation pressures from international buyers on the urban poor. The mayor is proactive in getting people to join the BM program, however the majority of land is privately owned so access to land proves difficult.
Main learnings
There is a strong influence by external actors making the case unique. The mayor recognises the lack of knowledge and faith in the program by the urban poor so has supported and publicized the pilot project whenever possible, from locating the savings group in the municipal building to engaging in negotiating for the price of the land, making public events out of preparing the land and receiving the CODI loan. The pilot project brought together people from 5 different sites. Although the communities are now fragmented, and the people with the most motivation and financial leverage have left, the hope is the pilot project will be able to act as a hub to skill up and support the communities left behind in the fragmentation process. The second community to enter the BM program was mobilized by the landowners son and a retired school teacher after the community failed to organise themselves. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 101) and A3 (page 113).
f.40

Kao Noi Community
present
f.41
Railway Community
f.43 present
f.42

The activism and support of local authority through the Mayor has been instrumental in pushing communities to organize and negotiate land for relocation. Middle-class philanthropy and activism had a crucial role to play. Nonetheless, relocation was paralleled by the marginalizing of the 2/3 of the communities who did not join the program, thus raising questions about inclusion.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 44) shows the main actors negotiation in Pattaya, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 45+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
f.44
f.45
Pattaya: Diagrammatic site
Political
- Survey conducted by the municipality under Social Welfare Department; 33 informal communities identified in Pattaya, research brought CODI in through NHA - Huge political will to get people interested in Baan Mankong, with particular commitment to the Kanoi pilot project
Political
Economic
- The 5 communities to be relocated to Kanoi from across Pattaya set up a saving group covering 7 different funds, (not all joined) - Meetings of the savings group continue to be held in the Local District offices - Railway community has 1 saving group with a lot of mistrust - Kanoi community, using savings to fund various economic activities such as business enterprises, has future business plans such as brick production and recycling centre
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Due to fire eviction and inability to negotiate with Port authority on a lease, five sites coming together into Kanoi leaving 2/3 communities behind. Future plans to buy neighbouring site - Railway community site relocation taking place due to pressures from landlord because of rising land value, though landlord also helps to mobilize them - Mayor active in negotiation of land
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Due to fire eviction and inability to negotiate with Port authority on a lease, five sites coming together into Kanoi leaving 2/3 communities behind. Future plans to buy neighbouring site - Railway community site relocation taking place due to pressures from landlord because of rising land value, though landlord also helps to mobilize them - Mayor active in negotiation of land
Cultural
- Conscious inclusion of 14 who defaulted on loans in site design - Holystone ceremony in Kanoi pilot community secured faith in Baan Mankong by previously distrustful Railway community members - Civil society is helping the communities to get organized
Site 5: Bang Prong

General description
Once rural farmland, the district of Bang Prong has been saturated with clusters of heavy industry since the 1960s accompanied by a large number of low income migrant workers from rural Thailand who often make Bang Prong their temporary home in small diasporic clusters near to their employment. The urbanisation of Bangkok and the increasing constraints on land, however is again beginning to transform and densify this area in new ways.
Main learnings
Promoted and heavily endorsed throughout the district by the Local Authority of Bang Prong, Baan Mangkong participants at the individual level have been united with other willing households across the district to form new communities that have been empowered to successfully upgrade, build strategic alliances and capacity. The formation of new communities of mobilised and relatively higher-income households from a range of established communities has begun to reconfigure social relations across the district. Transient and low income renters with casual employment are finding it difficult to upgrade their homes and find security of tenure in a way that complements their lifestyle, contributing to the socio-spatial polarisation of Bang Prong. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 102) and A3 (page 106).
f.46

Bang Prong 1 Community
present
f.49
f.47
Bang Prong 2 Community
f.50
present
f.48

As in Pattaya, the activism and support of local authority through the Mayor has been instrumental in pushing communities to organize and negotiate land for relocation. Nonetheless, the marginalizing of financially disadvantaged households, including renters and elderly, and the perpetuation of income disparity and well being, raise crucial questions about inclusion.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 51) shows the main actors negotiation in Bang Prong, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 52+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
f.51
f.52
Bang Prong: Diagrammatic site
Political
- Industrialisation attracted communities from rural areas who formed pockets of spatially disconnected settlements - The local authority advertised the Baan Mangkong programme in the area and introduced interested parties - Local authority actively supported Baan Mankong programme in a range of ways including changing building regulations and policies
Political
Economic
- Communities actively set up inter and intra community savings groups across Bang Prong for various things. - Most households chose not to join the Baan Mankong savings groups - for example transient factory workers, low income renters and elderly people
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Rapid urbanisation is leaving low income or transient renters with increasingly insecure tenure. - The factories nearby are leaving all Bang Prong communities with severe environmental and health problems
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Rapid urbanisation is leaving low income or transient renters with increasingly insecure tenure. - The factories nearby are leaving all Bang Prong communities with severe environmental and health problems
Cultural
- The local authority (current mayor) supportive of excluded households joining the Baan Mankong programme however currently marginalised households such as renters, the elderly and lowest income continue to be affected by speculative development and individual interests of current Baan Mankong participants.
Site 6: Nonthaburi
General description
The urban sprawl of Bangkok is rapidly incorporating this previously rural area into the body of the metropolis. Huge infrastructural projects are ongoing, such as a new Skytrain line and the Underground extension. Along with them, residential blocks, factories, and shopping malls are sprouting up. As the city expands, appetite for land is increasing fast, and so does its price.
Main learnings
A process of social and physical restructuring is going on in Nonthaburi. This process is promoted among others by CODI through the Baan Mankong programme, and is centred on the concept of community as a bounded entity. This is reflected in the physical outcomes of the upgrading projects. Given the availability of unbuilt land, most of the upgrading projects proceed through relocation. In this way, previously scattered people reorganize in communities to which a clearly defined neighbourhood corresponds, marked by a boundary, a fence, and a gate. At local level, this has often produced cohesive and compact communities of which those that have already completed the construction proved to be able to carry on the upgrading well beyond the land and housing question. At province-wide level, these communities are networked through NULICO, the Baan Mankong, and the Provincial Authority. Yet at the intermediate level, communities find it hard to look beyond their boundaries. This adds to the fragmentation of the physical and social landscape of Nonthaburi. For a deeper understanding of the site, review Appendices A2 (page 103) and A3 (page 119).
f.53

Rattanatibet 14 Community
present
f.54
Ruammit Patthana
present
f.56
f.57
f.55

Support from the provincial, district and subdistrict governments has played a crucial role in mobilizing communities, paralleled by financial and organization support from CODI. Pressure on communities to organize varied, but as in Pattaya and Bang Prong, the approach of relocation of consenting households from individual communities marginalized those unable or refusing to join.
SPATIAL
ECONOMIC
The wheel (Figure 58) shows the main actors negotiation in Nonthaburi, according to the four dimensions of transformation defined: spatial, economic, political and cultural. For a better understanding of each of these dimensions in this site, the following maps (Figure 59+layers) show the main issues separated by the four layers grounded into space, and a brief explanation of each one.
POLITICAL
CULTURAL
f.58
f.59
Nonthaburi: Diagrammatic site
Political
- 8 communities in the district joined Baan Mankong - Provincial government has been instrumental in mobilising 3 communities; active organisation from one community due to threat of evictions by private landowner because of rising land value - Other communities were pressured to move due to the ongoing sky train extension project - Communities along the canals were pushed to relocate, in that supported by the sub-district government
Political
Economic
- In 2 communities, active and diversified savings groups cover different funds beyond just housing - In the non-upgraded community, not all households agreed to join, generating conflict within community - Internal conflict in the pilot upgraded community. Many households unable to continue saving - The Flood Fund from CODI has supported at least two communities in the province
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Rapid urbanisation and rising land prices causing landowners to push communities out of their land - Extensive availability of land has made it easy for communities choosing to upgrade to relocate - While floods have been used as the justification to relocate some communities, the desire to save money meant most land negotiated for and purchased is on flood plains
Political
Economic
Spatial
- Rapid urbanisation and rising land prices causing landowners to push communities out of their land - Extensive availability of land has made it easy for communities choosing to upgrade to relocate - While floods have been used as the justification to relocate some communities, the desire to save money meant most land negotiated for and purchased is on flood plains
Cultural
- Multi-religious communities hold religious festivities and common events - The communities not yet upgraded are facing a lot of conflict - Dispersed households have relocated in compact communities, thus marginalising communities left behind - Drug problems widespread in some communities - Although CODI says relocation is last resort, it seems to be the trend in Nonthaburi
3. Findings & analysis
3. Findings & analysis

From out of site research methodologies and analysis, overall patterns and findings emerged around the process of the BM programme. First we present some general patterns, followed by 12 opportunities and obstacles synthesiying our findings. The findings reveal an incredible flexibility to the BM programme (see Figure 60). Ms. Boonyabancha, the former director of CODI, acknowledges that a strength of the program is that it doesnt dictate a clear outcome, hence, communities are constantly able to appropriate the program in unique ways. But also, flexibility is a key element of the programs effectiveness and reproduction, for it can be adapted to diverse situations. Some other patterns that emerged around the push or pull of negotiations and strategic alliances involved on the dynamics of the upgrading process. Those people unable or unwilling to join often marginalised by the community, in relocation they are left behind, and in upgrading often pushed out. Diversity of funding beyond just housing proved an effective way to include people who arent part of the program, as well as keeping people involved after the housing loan is payed off. Spatially possibilities for access to land and tenure security is limited to concessions of what the land owner is willing to make; the influence by BM (NULICO / CODI) is very limited and the local authority is often a critical actor in successful negotiations. The presence of powerful actors in the sites had the positive effect of initiating the mobilisation
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009
process, however, such support did not necessarily equate to strong social cohesion within the communities, nor did it offer the promise of lasting social inclusion in the form of policy change. Another key finding is the large gap in the cultural dimension. If, as we stated, cultural justice concerns inclusion, this involves more than negotiating with particular individual actors, but a general recognition by the status quo. Whats not represented in the actor maps is the rest of the city, such as local university institutions, migrants and the middle class who offer key potential strategic alliances towards social inclusion. Our 12 opportunities obstacles capitalise on missed opportunities for greater social inclusion, presented in Figure 73 (page 57), in relation to the upgrading process.
2010 2011 2012
f.60 Using community level actors maps we compiled a timeline showing the various phases of BM program for communities visited and duration of each phase. Through the diversity of the processes in each community, we can observe the flexibility of the programme.
2000
Chareonchai Nimithai Lamg Witthayalaiken Chankaseam Kao Pattana Ruamsamakee Nomklao Sapsin Mai Sapsin Kao Sang Kee Suan Plu Lung Talad Kaowat Prayakrai Kao Noi Railway Community Bang Prong 1 Bang Prong 2 Ruamjai Saiyai Khunsri Pak Khlong Chao Fareast Ruammit Patthana Inudom
2001
2002
2003
ORGANIZATION SAVING NEGOTIATION & DESIGN CONSTRUCTION
PAGE 52 | Findings & analysis
?@
Potential of design
Design has the potential to translate social relations in the urban fabric and at the same time to influence them. This potential is not being fully utilized as the number of community architects is limited and their role is restricted to that of being facilitators. Cost and time constraints bring about standardized solutions which neglect diversity of needs.
e
Communal spaces
Communal spaces have the capacity to shape social relations within and across communities. This is often overlooked in the upgrading projects, as individual demands and spaces are prioritized over the communal ones. Spaces designated as public in the plan - i.e. parks or playgrounds - are often actually neglected or used for other purposes.
Land as a resource
In Bangkok, lower income population has access to land, which can be employed as a resource. As such, communities are subject to economic pressures of land markets (density, location) and interests of landowners. Often communities dont make the most of their asset in order to respond to these pressures. Their focus is limited to land for housing.
f.61
f.62
f.63
Findings & analysis | PAGE 53
X
Cycle of upgrading
The upgrading process is flexible and broader than the provision of housing itself. However there are some gaps in the cycle of upgrading, starting with participation in the design process, to the provision of livable temporary housing, building regulations and quality control of construction, post-occupancy evaluation of completed units and maintenance.
GHGHGH
Diversification of saving groups
Financial organization by communities is rooted in housing upgrading and land tenure security, but often ceases after construction completion. Some communities have organized savings groups beyond housing to cover welfare, livelihoods opportunities, education etc. and attract households not able or willing to join the BM program. The emergence of Community Development Funds is an opportunity to scale-up financial empowerment and enable collaboration further among actors. Diversifying funds is an opportunity for organization fundamental for sustaining momentum, and producing cohesion between various actors.
Diversification of funding sources

Communities and organizations have the capacity to tap into multiple funding sources beyond CODI, such as private sponsors, the BMA, local authorities, village funds, etc. However, there is potential for a better coordination among the various stakeholders in provision of funding and resources for upgrading.
f.64
f.65
f.66
X s
FGHJFGHJ FGHJFGHJ FGHJFGHJ

Multiplicity of stakeholders
There are many instances of ongoing processes of transformation beside BM. Multiple actors play a key role in the process of upgrading across all sites. These are not limited to CODI, but include among others the Crown Property Bureau, Treasury Department, Local Authorities, local architects, private enterprises. There is an opportunity to bring together and coordinate these actors.
y
Precedent setting
Thanks to strong community networks, positive precedent settings are actively used to trigger organization in other communities and exchange knowledge. It would be possible to use negative precedent settings too, examining context and causes of the difficulties as a way to formulate alternatives and remove obstacles.
Inclusion
Currently, BM targets people who plan to settle permanently in the long run, but does not provide options for the inclusion of households unable or unwilling to participate based on the programs current conditions. There is the opportunity to include a broader range of people in the BM programme, such as renters, elderly and temporary workers
f.67
f.68
f.69
`
Transparency
There are many examples of strong leadership in the communities, which is often crucial in building organization. However, there are issues concerning the flow of information within and sometimes among communities. In some cases, more transparency would help building trust and confidence.
YYY Y YY Y
Fragmentation
Baan Mankong increases the capacity of urban poor to negotiate for land, and consequently they can access to well located and even prime land within the city. However, the program is also centred on the concept of community as a bounded entity. This is reflected in the physical outcomes of the upgrading projects, that are not taking full advantage of their position within the city.
x
Ethics of State institutions
The ethics of the State institutions - such as Local District Authorities, the Crown Property Bureau and Treasury Department - gives lower income populations the possibility to settle on land that would otherwise be unaffordable to them. However, substantial community mobilization and support for negotiation around upgrading is not reflected in genuine long-term institutional policies towards social inclusion. Such institutions are the main actors in Bangkok and across Thailand, and have the capacity to deeply influence access to land for all across the city.
f.70
f.71
f.72
Opportunities & time

Potential of design Communal spaces Land as a resource
?@
SITE 1 Chareonchai Nimithai
eY
W X
Cycle of upgrading Diversification of saving groups
Inclusion
GHGHGH
X s
Precedent setting
Transparency
Fragmentation
y `
YY YY YY Y Y
SITE 2 Kao Pattana
SITE 3 Suan Plu
SITE 4 Railway Community
SITE 5 Bang Prong 1
SITE 6 Ruammit Patthana
f.73 We selected one community for each site and defined when the 12 opportunities occur. They are distributed at different stages of the programme. Because of BM flexibility, opportunities are spread on the time. In the development of strategies, we will see how these opportunities are addressed by each strategy and, therefore, how the different stages of the programme are conduced.
ORGANIZATION SAVING NEGOTIATION & DESIGN CONSTRUCTION
4. Strategies: imprinting strategic alliances into space
4. Strategies:
In the site analysis we presented 12 points of missed opportunities for intensifying Strategic Alliances and imprinting their effects into the production of space towards a more inclusive city. As alluded before the definition of printmaking is based on the idea that each piece or layer of prints
imprinting strategic alliances into space

is produced not as a copy, but considered an original, since it is not a reproduction of another work of art but an impression of it. The unique layers are the multiple yet unique processes instigated by mobilization around upgrading and beyond Baan Mankong. The four strategies presented in this section seek to consolidate networks and to find ways of imprinting them in space. Each strategy is presented with a list of actions, and a reflection on how we ground our vision, and finding room to intensify and broaden the Strategic Alliances to perpetuate social inclusion based on our definition of scaling up.
Strategy 1:
Strategy 2:
Strategy 3:
Strategy 4:
Design as praxis
Alternative responses to land pressures
Sustaining momentum and collectivity
Shaping the city beyond Baan Mankong
?@
Potential of design
e
Communal spaces
Land as a resource
W X
GHGHGH
X s

y `
Precedent setting Transparency
YYY Y YY Y
Fragmentation
x
PAGE 60 | Strategies
Cycle of upgrading Diversification of saving groups
Inclusion
f.74
Strategy 1:
Design as praxis
The high flexibility of the Baan Mankong programme is not reflected in its physical outcomes, which are often standardized. This is due not only to financial and time constraints, but also to the limited role of the design within the upgrading process. For CODI, during the process of design people are the main solution-finders and the main delivery mechanism (CODI, 2012). However, we found that design professionals and CODI can play a wider role to complement and push forward processes of innovation, through both reflection and practice (praxis).
Action 1.1
CODI could broaden its use of design as a catalyst. Even if Community Architects are already involved in the design process, CODI could involve them in communities where the programme has not been developed yet. It could also promote temporary interventions, in collaboration with architects and artists, in already established communities. This would be a way to stimulate, provoke and trigger involvement in the project and open possibilities for different future options. Strategic alliances proposed
CODI Community Networks Architects Community architects Artists
Opportunities addressed
Potential of design
?@ e
Communal spaces

y
Precedent setting
YYY Y Y Y
Fragmentation
When?
Pre-organization and organization phases.
f.75. temporary interventions

Strategies | PAGE 61
Story box 11
Action 1.2
Baan Mankong could increase the priority of communal spaces in site-plan to strengthen relationships within and beyond communities. The architects involved in community planning could promote the integration across the borders of the neighbourhood through the design of public spaces. It could be interesting to focus on transitional spaces, that mediate between the community itself and its surroundings. The funding for this action can be included in CODI infrastructure grants or covered by other fundings, such as Government village funds or private sponsors. We found some examples1of privately funded interventions on public space in Bangkok lower-income neighbourhoods (See also strategy 4 and story box 11). Strategic alliances proposed
Community Networks Private Sponsors Goverment Community architects
f.77
f.76. Transitional spaces 1. See http://www.tyintegnestue.no/prosjekter/klong-toey-community-lantern/

PAGE 62| Strategies
Strategy 1 Action 1.3

It is fundamental to mainstream the discussion about design in the process of upgrading among different actors. In this direction, universities can incorporate programs aimed at forming professionals specialized in urban upgrading - following the example of the King Mongkuts University of Technology Thonburi. This can also contribute to ease the lack of CODI architects - an issue that jeopardizes the design quality of the upgrading projects - and to maintain them in the long term. Strategic alliances proposed
CODI Architect Universities
Grounding the vision:
How does it imprint the networks into space?

Networks within and between communities are in the centre of Baan Mankong programme. However, sometimes these social connections have no clear physical manifestation. By using the space even only imagined or temporary - as an active agent, this strategy will blur the boundaries between communities and their surroundings, and better integrate them physically and socially in their context. This will concretize CODIs vision of upgrading as an improvement of the relations between the urban poor communities and the wider city (Boonyabancha, 2005).
Area of transformation
f.78. Students in community.
f.79
Strategy 2:
Alternative responses to land pressures

Land acquisition is one of the core issues of the Baan Mankong programme. An important question that arose from our site work has been how the communities respond to pressures over land. In order to withstand these pressures and at the same time ensure inclusivity, communities need to actively employ the land they have access to as an asset, using it in a flexible, productive way. This strategy aims at envisioning alternative urban interventions to offer increased options in terms of housing and density that are more responsive to land constraints and urban pressures.
Action 2.1
The main target of Baan Mankong interventions are people who plan to settle permanently in the long run. However, in the field we observed that a huge part of the population, given their income, lifestyle, work, etc., dont have the possibility to join the programme. Renters, for instance, face constraints to be part of upgrading, and most of the time are excluded from the processes of negotiation. CODI and NULICO could promote the formalization of networks of renters with participation in institutional instances, in order to constitute a body with negotiation power. Parallel upgrading schemes could introduce rental units in order to broaden the range of people involved. The rental units could also generate incomes for the cooperative, to avoid possible conflicts with the permanent residents. (See also strategy 3.3) Strategic alliances proposed
Renters CODI NULICO Communities
Potential of design
?@
Land as a resource
X s
Inclusion

x
YYY Y Y Y
When?
Organisation, negotiation and design phases.
f.80. Rental units for tourism temporary workers

Story box 12
Action 2.2
Due to time and financial constraints, standardized solutions are often employed in Baan Mankong upgrading sites. In many completed communities, we observed illegal extensions of houses, usually precarious shacks filling up the setback behind blocks. Large families often expand their house outwards because they need more space, even if it is not permitted by the building regulation (See Story box 12). On the other hand, there are examples of single individuals living in a two-storey house, for which they have to pay more than what they need. Incremental design could be introduced by CODI, in partnerships with architects and Universities, as part of the program. This would allow higher economic and spatial flexibility and a more inclusive upgrading processes. Strategic alliances proposed
Architects Communities
f.82
f.81. Incremental design


Currently, communities have to negotiate the land with a variety of landowners. The relations with them are as varied as the landowners themselves. Some of them have a lot of control over the upgrading (as the CPB in Wang Thonglang and Bang Kho Laem), while others are small private owners (as in Nonthaburi). Therefore, it is necessary to diversify the instances of negotiation and coordination with landowners, according to their nature (private, public), quantity of land and resources. CODI could formalize these instances of negotiation recognizing those differences. For instance, big landowners such as CPB or the Treasury Department can be part of formal committees of negotiation with communities, CODI, NULICO, etc. On the other hand, private landowners can receive financial incentives to incorporate rental units, or specific schemes as part of a wider agenda led by CODI and the communities. Strategic alliances proposed
CODI Community Private Landowners Public Landowners Local Authorities

Currently, the Baan Mankong programme promotes the consolidation and intensification of networks within and among communities that share common goals and interests. The physical output, most of the times, is a bounded community with homogeneous solutions, that sometimes exchanges experiences with other communities in similar situations. In reality, however, community members have relations and exchange with more varied people, both for social and labour reasons. These networks of diverse people can be grounded on the physicality of the communities through more inclusive actions, as the ones presented in this strategy. It will shape a more inclusive city recognizing the diversity of the networks that already exists.
f.83. Land sharing scheme

f.84
Strategy 3:
Sustaining momentum and collectivity

Upgrading as conceived by Baan Mankong goes beyond the physical aspects: by revitalizing the culture of collectivity it changes relationships within the city and allows urban poor communities space and freedom (Boonyabancha, 2005). However, we observed that some communities tend to interpret upgrading in a more narrow sense, focusing only on securing land and providing housing. After achieving this initial goal, communities find it difficult to keep cohesion. This makes them more vulnerable and has negative effects on the long-term success of the Baan Mankong project. This strategy aims at sustaining the momentum created through the process, in order to maintain the political mobilisation and social capital and to unleash the transformative potential of the programme.
Action 3.1
Community networks are at the core of the Baan Mankong programme as platform of negotiation between a single community and the city (Boonyabancha, 2005). Yet in the field we observed that in some cases, networks are centred around community leaders and not around the community itself. This results in a lack of communication, which hinders the programme. CODI could introduce standards about transparency and accountability between leaders and communities from the beginning of the process (information boards, newsletter, voxbox, SMS, etc.), in order to increase confidence about money management and leadership and the programme as a whole. Strategic alliances proposed
CODI Community leaders Community
Land as a resource Cycle of upgrading
W X
$ $
GHGHGH
Diversification of saving groups

`
Transparency
When?
Organization, construction, post-construction
f.85. Information boards
Story box 13
Action 3.2
At community scale, monitoring and evaluation of the upgrading process across its entire course is often missing. In collaboration with university students, communities could collect visual and written material telling their history, through periodic (6-month) participatory mapping, and produce reports. The information thus gathered should be shared with other actors (such as district authorities, CODI, NULICO or other communities), to reconfigure the procedures and policies within the program. This periodic report could be included in Baan Mankong guidance lines as a way for the communities to recap and keep the focus of attention on the upgrading process. Strategic alliances proposed
Academia District authorities Communities Communities CODI NULICO
f.87
f.86. Participatory mapping


Some communities proved able to capitalize on saving groups and received funds, starting off community enterprises and creating new jobs and sources of income. Such examples have been found across four sites: for instance, community savings have been used to open a fishery that employs five members of the community itself in Ruammit Patthana (Nonthaburi), and to set up mushroom houses in Ruam Samakee (Wangtonglang) and Inudom (See Story box 13). We think this is crucial to guarantee communities financial independence and to shift their perception of themselves, in line with CODI principles. There is room to widen the impact of such practices. Processing raw materials within the comStrategic alliances proposed
CODI Community Private enterprises Academia

munity considerably adds value to the product: community-led recycling activities are going on in Chatuchak district and Nonthaburi province, and a few communities are using collected waste to produce new objects for sale. Through certified trainings or financial skills workshops organized by CODI in collaboration with private enterprises (with Corporate Social Responsibility schemes) and academia, such practices could be exported to other communities. Furthermore, marketing of these activities could be enhanced with advertisement through the media, internet, or the existing district-wide networks. The profits can contribute to strengthen the role of CDFs as community-led revolving funds.

This strategy is focused in intensifying strategic alliances rather than imprinting them into space. However, the intensification of this networks over time will reduce vulnerability and increase resilience and opportunities of the communities, strengthening their position in the city. In this context, community members can become active citizens, influencing how the city is shaped.
f.89 f.88. Community enterprise

Strategy 4:
Shaping the city beyond Baan Mankong

In the field we observed a wide range of initiatives that are dealing with processes of upgrading and transformation. In many cases, CODI is not leading these initiatives, and sometimes it isnt even aware of them. Baan Mankong produces compact communities and promotes networking among them. The space that separates these communities is often overlooked by the programme, and the events going on there are not fully integrated in the process. Those actors are in a hidden area: this strategy will unearth the processes of upgrading and change that are taking part in Bangkok beyond the Baan Mankong programme, and include the rest of society in the transformative drive towards an inclusive city.
Action 4.1
It is important to open the horizon of the communities. An important step in this direction would be to introduce public infrastructure and facilities inside or next to the communities - such as schools, libraries, temples, health services - to be used by people from the neighbourhood, beyond the community. This implies a broader coordination among actors from the planning stage, at Subdistrict and District level, well beyond the single upgrading project: there is a need to create guidance promoting physical integration between different communities and developments. The whole process of land research and negotiation by the communities could be reconsidered, and facilitated, within this framework. Strategic alliances proposed
DIistrict Sub district CODI Community
e
Communal spaces
X s
YYY Y Y Y
Inclusion

Fragmentation
When?
Parallel process.
f.90. School in the community


Many upgrading activities were observed, in parallel and independently from Baan Mankong. There are exampls of Subdistrict-led upgrading in collaboration with the community (Ruamjai Saiyai), post-flooding upgrading (Lang Witthatalaikro Chankaseam), community clinics (Phahoyothin 32), private-sponsored common space improvements (Klong Toey), etc. Mapping these parallel processes of transformation across Bangkok brings the awareness of city dynamics. This could be a different way to understand the idea of precedent-setting, that is at the centre of BM principles. Each scale has something different to offer, and the whole city can learn comStrategic alliances proposed
Bangkok residents Communities CODI

prehensively from the whole city. This mapping and later coordination among new actors, could bring collective thinking at Bangkok development. The creation of coalitions and coordination of existing processes can impulse common future strategies. Consolidate forces with shared demands towards discursive planning at Bangkok level, pushes the policy framework to more inclusive views. These collective maps are coordinated by CODI and are done by communities and residents of the district. BMA,Local government, and students could collaborate with the data.

This strategy employs space as an active agent that, through the use people make of it, can influence social relations at the intermediate level - between the community and its surroundings. By coordinating CODI and Baan Mankong with communities, institutions, financiers and professionals that are not part of the programme, this strategy will capitalize on processes of transformation led by different stakeholders and find overlaps and points of synergy, thus addressing a citywide process of inclusion.
f.92 f.91. Collective mapping of iniciatives

Conclusion
Conclusion
We set off or Bangkok with the aim of understanding how social transformation occurs and scales up, through the lens of the Baan Mankong programme in Thailand. We defined transformation as a process of bridging the gap between the individual and the structure, through a radical redefinition of the collective, that arises from a dialogue among top-down and bottom-up actors. This interaction takes place in what we called the space of transformation and its dimensions that we divided in political, economic, cultural and spatial, where structural reform and peoples agency find points of agreement and form strategic alliances. In our understanding, to amplify or scale up this transformative process it is necessary not only to open up this space, but also to fill it in, bringing in more actors from the top-down and bottom-up and intensifying these strategic alliances. By means of these coalitions, power can be extended (Eyben, Harris, and Petit, 2010); it is precisely this extension that props up and scales on transformation.
PAGE 74 | Conclusion
In this way, our analysis brought us to the redefinition of the concept towards a more multidimensional meaning of scaling up, which is trough time, scaling on; through space, scaling across; and through forces of collaboration, scaling in and out. Our permanent discussions of these concepts have been in constant relation with our wheel tool, which helped us to unpack its theoretical meaning and ground them through the actor relationships we observed in the sites. It is not perfect and sometimes confusing in its process, but through graphically mapping these relations and events, we could understand in a clearer way where were the gaps in the transformation area that guided our strategies. Through our collective analysis of Baan Mankong in Bangkok, we observed that the programme is actively promoting social interrelations and platforms of negotiation between people and institutions. This promotion occurs within an incredible flexibility that allows communities to appropriate the programme in different ways.
However, we observed that the programme also contributes to the shaping of insular communities. These introverted urban pieces are networked and serve to sustain each other, yet they arent integrated with their surroundings at intermediate scale. There is a detachment in social alliances that seem to be organised at both the localised and citywide scale, but not at the intermediate level, integrating other segments of society. As a result, the city functions as a discrete system. CODIs rhetoric speaks of upgrading relationships of the urban poor with the city: in order to realize this vision more successfully, it is critical to recognize, emphasize and operate at this intermediate scale. As Gaventa (2006) argues, any change strategy must concern itself with how to build and sustain effective change across the full continuum (emphasis added). Otherwise, the outcome will necessarily be a decomposed city. To open up communities to the city, and the city to the communities, then becomes a crucial matter of urban transformation; one in which design can have a decisive role. The
Discrete system
Intermediate scale
strategies we devised aim at directing Baan Mankong in this direction: moving from the discrete system to an intermediate scale inclusive system where there is not an outside-inside but a merged relationship between the parts that constantly offer things to each other (see Figure 93). As future development practitioners, the experience in Bangkok let us reflect about the possibilities of new ways of design, that together with financial mechanisms, can be employed to ground the diversity and extensiveness of social relations into the body of the city, and to create spaces that reflect this heterogeneity and promote inclusion and self-determination; methods to design the printmaking of strategic alliances into the city. Through this dynamic interplay among space production and social relations, along with political and financial drives, it is possible to push forward transformation and redefine the boundaries of the possible.
f.93
Conclusion | PAGE 75
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List of figures
Covers Report cover _ by Francesco Pasta Who we are map _ by Elsbet Alen Introduction & context_ photo by Francesco Pasta Vision _ photo by Elsbet Alen Methodologies and site _ photo by Elsbet Alen Findings _ photo by Francesco Pasta Strategies _ photo by Elsbet Alen Conclusion _ photo by Elsbet Alen Appendices _ photo by Elsbet Alen f.01 f.02 f.03 f.04 f.05 f.06 f.07 f.08 photo by Francesco Pasta photo by Camila Cocia photo by Camila Cocia photo by Camila Cocia photo by Francesco Pasta photo by Camila Cocia photo by Camila Cocia photo by Francesco Pasta f.16 f.17 f.18 f.19 f.20 f.21 f.22 f.23 f.24 f.25 f.26 f.27 f.28 f.29 f.30 f.31 f.32 f.33 f.34 f.35 f.36 f.37 f.38 Land Wheel _ by authors Spatial Wheel _ by authors Map of Sites _ by Chris Montgomery Site 1 Chatuchak _ photo by Elisabetta Bricchetto Community-level actor map Lang Witthayalai kru Chankaseam Community _ by authors Community-level actor map Chareonchai Nimitmai Community _ by authors Story Box 1 _ photo by Paola Fuentes Story Box 2 _ sketch by Elisabetta Bricchetto Site-level negotiation map _ by authors a, b, c, d _ Chatuchak Diagrammatic Site _ by authors Site 2 Wangthonglang _ photo by Liz Price Community-level actor map Thepleela Commu nity _ by authors Community-level actor map Kao Pattana Community _ by authors Story Box 3 _ photo by Budoor Bukhari Story Box 4 _ photo by Budoor Bukhari Site-level negotiation map _ by authors a, b, c, d _ Wang Tonglang Diagrammatic Site _ by authors Site 3 Bank Kho Laem _ photo by Camila Cocia Community-level actor map Suan Plu Commu nity _ by authors Community-level actor map Lung Talad Kao Wat Prayakrai Community _ by authors Story Box 5 _ photo by Camila Cocia Story Box 6 _ photo by Camila Cocia Site-level negotiation map _ by authors f.39 f.40 f.41 f.42 f.43 f.44 f.45 f.46 f.47 f.48 f.49 f.50 f.51 f.52 f.53 f.54 f.55 f.56 f.57 f.58 f.59 a, b, c, d _ Bang Kho Laem Diagrammatic Site _ by authors Site 4 Pattaya _ photo by Elsbet Alen Community-level actor map Kao Noi Commu nity _ by authors Community-level actor map Railway Commu nity _ by authors Story Box 7 _ photo by Elsbet Alen Site-level negotiation map _ by authors a, b, c, d _ Pattaya Diagrammatic Site _ by authors Site 5 Bang Prong _ photo by Rachel Felicia Community-level actor map Bang Prong 1 Community _ by authors Community-level actor map Bang Prong 2 Community _ by authors Story Box 8 _ photo by Lisa Hanking Story Box 9 _ photo by Lisa Hanking Site-level negotiation map _ by authors a, b, c, d _ Bang Prong Diagrammatic Site _ by authors Site 6 Nonthaburi _ photo by Francesco Pasta Community-level actor map Rattanatibet Community _ by authors Community-level actor map Ruammit Commu nity _ by authors Story Box 10a _ photo by Francesco Pasta Story Box 10b _ photo by Francesco Pasta Site-level negotiation map _ by authors a, b, c, d _ Nonthaburi Diagrammatic Site _ by authors
1. Vision f.09 photo by Francesco Pasta f.10 Arena as produced space _ by authors f.11 Episodic process _ by authors f.12 Bottom-up process and top-down reform perspectives _ by authors f.13 Scaling up axes _ by authors f.14 Printmaking the city _ by authors 2. Methodologies and sites f.15 Actor Mapping Wheel _ by authors
PAGE 78 | List of figures
3. Findings and analysis f.60 Communities timeline f.61 Potential of design. Chatuchak District, Lang Witthayalaikru community_ photo by Bethany Ritter f.62 Communal Spaces. Playground as parking. Blue building: community centre. Nonthaburi, Inudom community _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.63 Land as Resource. Economic pressures influence design and density. Nonthaburi, Khunsri community _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.64 Cycle of Upgrading. Wangthonglang, Nomklao community _ photo by Liz Price f.65 Diversification of Savings Groups. Different accounts of savings for different proposes. Ruamit Patthana community _ photo by Fran cesco Pasta f.66 Diversification of Funding Sources. Communi ties leaders meeting with the CPB. Wangthong lang, Rungmanee Pattana community _ photo by Liz Price f.67 Inclusion. She is a renter, BM was not suitable for her and her family. Bang Prong 2, Bang Prong original community _ photo by Lisa Hanking f.68 Multiplicity of Stakeholders. Actors relation ship. Pattaya. Kao Noi community _ photo by Elsbet Alen f.69 Precedent setting. Obstacles in sustaining the upgrading program. Nonthaburi. Kheng Phra Tue community _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.70 Transparency. Sites presentations. CODIs
f.71
f.72
f.73
Headquarter _ photo by Elisabetta Bricchetto Fragmentation. Bang Kho Laem District, Lung Talad Kao Wat Pra Ya Krai community _ photo by Amit Bajracharya Ethics of State Institutions. Access land donated by landowner. Samutprakan, Bang Prong 2 community _ photo by Lisa Hanking Opportunities and time. Timeline per sites
4. Strategies: imprinting strategic alliances into space f.74 Strategies diagram _ by authors f.75 Temporary interventions _ by authors f.76 Transitional spaces _ by authors f.77 Story Box 11 _ photo by Ariel Shepherd f.78 Students in community _ by authors f.79 Strategy 1 diagram _ by authors f.80 Rental units for tourism temporary workers _ by authors f.81 Incremental design _ by authors f.82 Story Box 12 _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.83 Land sharing scheme _ by authors f.84 Strategy 2 diagram _ by authors f.85 Information boards_ by authors f.86 Participatory mapping _ by authors f.87 Story Box 13 _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.88 Community enterprise _ by authors f.89 Strategy 3 diagram _ by authors f.90 School in the community _ by authors f.91 Collective mapping of initiatives _ by authors f.92 Strategy 4 diagram _ by authors f.93 Diagnosis diagram
List of figures | PAGE 79
List of appendices figures

Appendices A1. Methodologies f.A01 Definition of transformation from interim presentation _ by authors f.A02 Transformation diagram interim presentation _ by authors f.A03 Wheel of transformation interim presentation _ by authors f.A04 Actor map interim presentation _ by authors f.A05 Pre-field presentation overview _ by authors f.A06 Actor map pre-field presentation _ by authors f.A07 Problems and opportunities pre-field presen tation _ by authors f.A08 Principles pre-field presentations _ by authors f.A09 Strategies and sub-strategies post-field presentation _ by authors f.A10 Strategies in wheel of transformation _ by authors f.A11 Areas of transformation related to the strate gies _ by authors A3. Sites diary f.A12 Site diary collage site 1, Jatujak _ photos by Elisabetta Bricchetto and Paola Fuentes f.A13 Main findings across the 8 communities _ photo by Bethany Ritter f.A14 Savings group map, Chareonchai Nimitmai community _ photo by Bethany Ritter f.A15 Mapping actors and finances in Rimkhlong pattahana bangbua _ photo by Paola Fuentes f.A16 Community story map in Rim Khlong PAWANA f.A17 f.A18 ladprao _ photo by Paola Fuentes Visualization of one of the alternatives provided to Lang Witthayalaikru Chankasema community _ by Elisabetta Bricchetto Alternative plans provided to Lang Witthayalai kru Chankasema community _ by Site group 1 Site diary collage site 2, Wangthonglang _ photos by Budoor Bukhari and Liz Prize Interviewing community residents and leaders _ photos by Liz Price River of life exercise _ photos by Liz Price Opportunities and challenges _ photo by Liz Price Rethinking housing design _ by Op Idea on information sharing: newsletter _ by Site group 2 Site diary collage site 3, Bangkholaem _ photos by Camila Cocia & Chris Montgomery Participatory mapping of surrounding areas _ photo by Camila Cocia Participatory mapping by children children _ photo by Camila Cocia Sites locations _ by Site group 3 Participatory workshop: housing _ photo by Camila Cocia Cover book of ideas _ by Site group 3 Idea on common space _ by Site group 3 Ideas on sharing information _ by Site group 3 Idea working with building interests _ by Site group 3 f.A19 f.A20 f.A21 f.A22 f.A23 f.A24 f.A25 f.A26 f.A27 f.A28 f.A29 f.A30 f.A31 f.A32 f.A33
PAGE 80 | List of figures
f.A34 f.A35 f.A36 f.A37
f.A38 f.A39 f.A40 f.A41 f.A42 f.A43 f.A44
Site diary collage site 4, Pattaya _ photos by Elsbet Alen and Ariel Shepherd Timeline of Kao Noi community derived from the River of Life exercise _ by Site group 4 Actor map, exercise with community leaders _ photos by Elsbet Alen Map of relocation site, current activities and aspirations for the future development _ by Ariel Shepherd Participatory exercise for the welfare houses on the relocation site _ photos by Elsbet Design proposal for the welfare houses _ by Bell Timeline of the Railway community derived from the River of Life exercise _ by Site group 4 Actor map, exercise with community leader _ photos by Elsbet Alen River of Life exercise _ photo by Elsbet Alen Participatory exercise for the site plan _ photo by Elsbet Alen Design proposal for the sites with flexible clusters _ by Bell, Luntom, Fern, Phouxay Site diary collage site 5, Bangprong _ photos by Lisa Hangking Diagram of the Baan Mankong process Bang Prong 1 and 2 and notes _ by Lisa Hanking Ideas Designing and building together _ by Rachel Felicia Bang Prong 2 Process analysis _ by Lina Gonzlez Ideas Designing and building together _ by Rachel Felicia
f.A50 f.A51
Notes from site visits _ by lisa Hangking
Site diary collage site, Nonthaburi _ photos by Francesco Pasta f.A52 Ruamjai Saiyai map _ by Francesco Pasta f.A53 Notes of fieldwork _ by Francesco Pasta f.A54 Community participatory mapping _ photo by Francesco Pasta f.A55 Participatory mapping: Thai key _ photo by Francesco Pasta A4. Attended seminars f.A56 Expansion of Bangkok 1850-2002 _ by Nattawut Usavagovitwong f.A57 Development plan of Thailand and Bangkok _ by Wijibusaba Ann Marome f.A58 Introduction Baan Mankong _ by Somsook Boonyabancha f.A59 Housing finance development in Thailand _ by Kitti Patpongpibul f.A60 Housing finance of poor informal communi ties _ by Somsook Boonyabancha f.A61 Politics of change, Somsook Boonyabancha _ photo by Camila Cocia f.A62 Panel Discussion _ photo by Paola Fuentes f.A63 Let people be the solution _ by ACHR f.A64 3 components of learning _ by Arsom Slip Institute of the Art f.A65 Visit to NHA and NHA project _ photo by Paola Fuentes f.A66 Visit to private developer _ photo by Paola Fuentes
List of figures | PAGE 81
f.A45 f.A46 f.A47 f.A48 f.A49
Appendices
A1. Methodologies
Next section will summarize the process of research with regard to Bangkok of the last 4 months. It is organize in four sections: (1) Interim presentation; (2) Pre-field presentation; (3) Sites methodologies; (4) Post-field presentation.
1. Interim presentation | 16th of March

Addressing the concept of transformation we have been later on developed farther, we have started deconstructing what we all agreed being our understanding of it, in a broad sense. We at first defined it as a process of structural change towards social justice, focusing on what are the main elements featuring this definition. We looked at the idea of process through its characteristic of being incremental and continuous over time and we thought that basic to its development is the achievement of the Collective realization of a transformative vision for what is yet to come (Boano & Frediani, 2012). A system of horizontal and vertical exchange contributes to the building of that vision, in this way leading to the formulation of a demand-driven and place-specific approach. Different actors (civil society, the state and the private sector, communities) over time have to come together and agree on a defined course of action or co-production usually over a defined period of time. They are characterized by different priorities and possibly conflictive power relations and they should construct and reconstruct a periodic consensus (Levi, 2012). In this system of action cumulative multiplier effects can take place and gradually change the material and institutional conditions of the poor, who become able to exercise their rights (Levi, 2012). As underpinning condition is the generation of an environment in which relationships of trust and respect among and between partners are built toward the achievement of a state of reciprocal equivalence. With regard to the precedent settings, they should be consolidated so that urban poor strategies are granted legitimacy and translated into city-wide strategies (DCruz and Satterthwaite, 2004). To unfold the concept of structural change we drew from the dictionary definition of the two terms to end in encompassing the key elements of the needed shift in power relations and of the institutionalization, whereby policies are introduced and implemented to enable and sustain peopledriven processes. The existing societal, economic and cultural constructs has here to be challenged and the alteration of the reality at place is possible through the capacity to get organized.
f.A01
INSTITUTIONAL
DISTRIBUTIONAL
TOP-DOWN POLICY CHANGE & TRANSFORMATION DEMOCRACY
RECOGNITION
DISTRIBUTION
LAND ACCESSIBILITY
COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION
LOCAL DEMOCRACY
SELFDETERMINATION
SELF-SUFFICIENCY AND VALUE
CONCEPTION, PERCEPTION AND USES
f.A02
PAGE 84 | Appendices A1
TOP-DOWN TRANSFORMATION
COLABORATION SPACE: COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION TRANSFORMATION
At this point we needed to visualize what we meant by transformation, in this way starting to actually ask ourselves who are the main actors involved in the process and what are the forces at place. We defined a central space, a stripe located in the middle; we called collaboration space. Toward it, actions from the bottom to the top and, reversely, from the top to the bottom, take place at the institutional and distributional level crossing the four entry points of transformation we saw as explicatory for a comprehensive overview of the process. Those are the political and cultural dimensions, placed under the institutional umbrella, and the economic and spatial ones assessed considering the distributional perspective. The main aim was, and remained through all our path of research, to achieve social justice, which implies a constant reconfiguration of institutional organization and material distribution in ways that challenge unjust power relations. We subsequently unpacked the notion of justice, breaking it into the political, economic, cultural and environmental sub components. At this point a tool able to assess and evaluate the level of change attainable has been constructed, keeping in mind and naming the driving forces coming both from the outside as well as the inside of the circular shape of the wheel we ended up drawing.
"Baan Mankong also has other dimensions: a social interaction dimension and a fund system dimension, which operate concurrently to ensure a more sustainable solution. (Boonyabancha, 2005). Transformation happens when a collaborative platform is created and therefore where a multitude of different actors are involved in its implementation. The upgrading process sees the encounter of the action of CODI as well as community cooperatives and their constant cooperation with land owners and private banks on one side, and NGOs and Academia on the other one. Two actor mappings have been developed to address the diversity of relationships at place during the whole process: a fund system interaction map trying to depicting the main financial flows making the system feasible in practice, and a social interaction map where the strongest dynamics of either collaboration or tension relate with the complexity and variety of stakeholders and the role they play. To concretize the analysis a first draft of list of problems and opportunities we identified as most emergent has been delineated. They have changed quite substantially during the next steps we passed through, hopefully gaining in major closeness to the real pattern is actually configured on the field.
f.A03
ASIAN DEVELOPMENT BANK
PRIVATE BANKS TD SRT
CPB
MILITARY
KING
INTERNATIONAL DONORS
LOCAL DEVELOPMENT FUNDATION
LANDOWNERS RID
PRIVATE OWNERS
PAT
ACCA
ACHR LOCAL NGOs IIED CITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE ACADEMIA
BUDDHIST TEMPLE
THAI GOVERNMENT GOVERNMENT HOUSING BANK
PRIME MINISTER
UPGRADING
CODI DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION
MINISTRY OF WELFARE
NSDB
DPU
BANGKOK METROPOLITAN AUTHORITY
COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT FUND

COOP
COMMUNITY NETWORK
COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE
NULICO
COOP
COOP
COMMUNITY NETWORK COMMUNITY NETWORK

HOUSEHOLD HOUSEHOLD
COMMUNITY COOPERATIVE
HOUSEHOLD HOUSEHOLD
COMMUNITY COOPERATIVE
HOUSEHOLD HOUSEHOLD
HOUSEHOLD HOUSEHOLD
HOUSEHOLD
HOUSEHOLD
HOUSEHOLD
HOUSEHOLD
f.A04
Appendices A1 | PAGE 85
2. Pre-field presentation | 25th of April

Our second definition of transformation draws from the first one, adding to it the elements elaborated during its deconstruction in sub components. It therefore results as more explicit in the message it aims to convey: transformation is a collaborative and episodic process of institutional and distributional change towards political, economic, spatial and cultural justice. We defined the actor mappings based on the two paradigms of institutional and distributional: in the first one it appears stakeholders like private landowners, District Government, community leaders and Community Architects, namely those who deal with the institutional context within which those distributions take place, [which includes] social structures and practices, the rules and norms that guide them, and the language and symbols that mediate social interactions within them, in institutions of state, family and civil society, as well as the workplace. (Young, 1991, p. 93) The distributional actor mapping considers the distribution of material goods and services and the actors involved in this process. We drew two maps, one more general and the second one focused on the specificity of the sites we were going to visit in the field trip. As important elements worthwhile to be considered are the turning points provoked by the occurrence of what we have called events. Those are triggering moments, either with a posi-
tive or a negative acceptation, which generate an occasion for change to those affected by them. From the actor mapping and the definition of transformation arose the principles defined as the following: collaborative, episodic and radical. We subsequently built our way of identifying the criteria, which want to be the means chosen to assess the degree of transformation achieved from the two main directions it is produced. To measure the first principle we named as collaborative we listed the following criteria: Collective recognition, conflictual participation, reciprocal equivalence and bridging the structure-agency gap. For the second principle, episodic the criteria are the following: trigger episodic events, enablement, continuous mobilization/ resistance and cumulative multiplier effect. From the last principle we drew these criteria: political justice, economic justice, cultural justice and spatial justice. Problems and opportunities are classified according to whom they are perceived as such. They have been listed and gathered under different categories: design, urban development policy, finance and networks. For each of the three principles we defined three general strategies. Under the first principle, collaborative process, springs the following question: How can we encourage collaboration in the way we see it within the BM program? From it the general strategy is spelled out: Generate and strengthen instances that involve multi-sectorial actors in
1
ACTOR MAPPING
TRANSFORMATION
2 4
PRINCIPLES/ CRITERIA
PROBLEMS AND OPPORTUNITIES
STRATEGIES
f.A05
f.A06
NETWORKS
collaborative processes, recognizing multiple claims and conflictive power relations. As we saw in the actor mapping, there are instances that are starting to fill the space of transformation (CODI, CDFs, CDCs, NULICO, Networks, etc.). Our strategy is to facilitate engagement processes that bring people together to talk/exchange knowledge. Three sub strategies aims then at pointing out possible methods in which the general strategy can be put in place, on the ground. At this stage the opportunities and problems are not overlooked but rather recalled through the icons with which they are represented, so as to specify for each strategy which are the issues possibly addressed. Under the second principle, episodic process, derives the question of how we can encourage an episodic process in the way we see it within the BM program. The general strategy originates from it is: Facilitate episodic mobilization towards transformation. Increase the capacity of different actors to take advantage of unexpected events. Answering the question of how the principle of radical transformation can be encouraged in the BM program it derives the last general strategy: Deepen democracy while seeking spatial justice based on the strategy of precedent setting (DCruz and Satterthwaite, 2004) as well as the actions that can be foreseen in order to apply it in practice. The last part of the presentation sees a list of questions and information gaps to bring with us and try to unfold in the field.
Urban Dev DESIGN POLICY
?@
OPPORTUNITY FOR
Limitation of community architects in terms of number, e ectiveness, capacities, roles and community.
Community Architects
PROBLEM FOR
CODI, Communities. Individuals, groups and communities
YYY Potential inexibility of house design within communities.
FINANCE NETWORKS
FINANCE
DESIGN
URBAN DEV POLICY
X
$
Involvementof private landowners within CODI, Community cooperatives, grassroots collaborative processes Government Uncertainty about capacity of the program to be sustainable in the long term related with land tenure and collective ownership. Involvement of private banks within grassroots collaborative processes. Role of CDFs supporting the upgrading of neighbourhoods Role of Nulico binding institutions and actors at macro and micro level Potential marginalization of individuals and groups within the community. Strengthening the role and capacities of coallitions.
CDCs, CODI, Community cooperatives CODI CDFs, CODI, Community cooperatives, Government CDFs, CODI, Community Government, GHB, CDCs cooperatives CDCs, CODI, Community cooperatives Government Individuals, groups and communities Individuals, Community cooperatives, CODI
c
GHGHGH
`
P
B CDCs as mediators within city wide
f.A07
f.A08
3. Sites methodologies | 26th of April - 12th of May

During our analysis in the field we developed diverse methods to gather the needed information. Apart from the standard techniques such as observing, taking pictures and sketching the condition of the environment we visited, we have experienced systems we were not used to work with. These implied mainly interviewing and mapping. With the mapping exercise we had the occasion to relate with the locals in a very creative and engaging way. Those who have participated were asked to tell and explain different stories with regard to the community they belong to. We divided into smaller groups in order to create a range of maps allowing us to clarify the formulation of certain elements through time. We questioned for instance matters related with finance, therefore often asking to define a timeline where every step of the collection of savings groups is spelled out. The storyline can obviously provide information to delineate the formation of a community, of its actions, decisions taken, important events occurred and networks established or broken up. Another kind of map we used the most is the one we have called the dream house: this is an exercise in which the interviewed is freely supposed to draw both with sketches and words the type of house or surrounding environment they would like to live in, considering the current condition they are embedded in. In this way the actual desires and aspirations of the population are clarified and the existing constrains emerge, allowing the hypothetical design process to have elements to start from in order to develop feasible alternatives. Through interviews aimed at understanding the most pressing and unsolved issues affecting the community at present, a group of people willing to have their say can help in not only listing but also assessing the seriousness of each problem. This method helps in portraying the condition of perceived or actually at place set of negative settings and again in building a more grounded understanding of the reality, which can lead to more suitable and sustainable design solutions. We collected personal stories concerned with daily life and the history of the community through interviews to individuals, mainly aiming at depicting where the main activities and jobs take place in a certain community and what are the elements and degrees of connection with the neighbouring communities and the rest of the city. This kind of interview provides information to also understand the level of place attachment as well as the social interaction attained. In most cases we drew also physical maps of the urban fabric present in the community and, when considered relevant, of the immediate surrounding. This mapping allows to be aware and recall for example where the upgrading has already taken place, what are the areas most left apart according to their actual location in the neighbourhood and what is the general morphology featuring the community. For instance the communities we visited in Chatuchak district, site 1, present a linear development very much constrained by the natural featuring of the canals. The general shape, building alignment and road pattern therefore follow the canal shore and are not projected in any other direction other than the longitudinal one. A larger map has been developed for each site so as to spatially collocate it in relation to the city at large, meanwhile also identifying the main transportation infrastructure present around and the actual utilization of it by the members of the communities. DAILY REPORT Where? Who? When? Material produced?
Visual information to select
Conclusion/feedback/suggestions
Sheet for information 1
BASIC DATA
Location
Zoom map (other paper)
PROCESS: SOCIAL
History.
Population Size N communities Main economic activities
Stage of the program Time of settlement Catalytic events
Obstacles (internal and external)
Threats Other important information Actors involved
ASK PEOPLE ABOUT: - Personal stories about daily life and history. - How do you imagine your life in 10 years? and the neighbourhood? - Map the surrounding area outside your neighbourhood. Do you know your neighbours in the sorrounding area?
Saving groups (number and tiers, size, meetings, etc.)
Future development
PROCESS: SOCIAL/ PHYSICAL Actor mapping 4 areas mapping
centripetal
centrifugal
?@
Process: How was/is the process of design and the role of community architects?
YYY
Outcome: What problems related to design and standardized houses emerged? Are people happy with the outcome?
Source 1: Source 2: Source 3:

Are there contingency plans for after the lease expires?
Have provate sector been involved? What is the relationship with the surrounding area?


$ Are/have CDFs been established? How? Stage? Who? GHGHGH Funding what?
Are/have private nanciers been involved? How?

Is/has NULICO been involved? Other community networs? Community builders? How?
B What has been the role of the CDC? How big? Stage? Who? For what?

Are/have individual or groups been marginalized? How?
Other issues...

4. Post-field presentation | 24th of May
We built our last presentation basically splitting it into two parts. The first one is concerned with the redefinition of opportunities and challenges, still represented as icons that allude to the concept they symbolise. We gathered them according to the area they locate themselves in, among the one we defined: housing design, finance, networks and city-scale. We decided not to explicitly say whether they are perceived as either problems or opportunities as this is not a fixed and once for all established element of evaluation. In fact their position varies according from which perspective they are considered and which are the actors in some how affected by them. For the second part of the presentation, starting from the opportunities and challenges we then built our strategies. We began with the collocation of the colours that identify the four entry points of transformation we determined in the first presentation: political, cultural, economic and spatial. We collocated them within the wheel of transformation, our tool, trying to portrait how they slide from one dimension of transformation to another and at what level of the circle they emerge, whether closer to the core of it or to the outside. The first strategy we defined is reconfiguring design. A list of sub-strategies draws from it, recalling the structure we previously set up in the
pre-field presentation, which helps in narrowing the focus and presenting more practical suggestions for making changes happening. The sub-strategies are located under the umbrella of a more general strategy, which in this case is: Mainstream the discussion about design in the process of upgrading among different actors in order to improve the responses at different levels. For each strategy we showed the icons of the opportunities and challenges that are supposed to be covered by the implementation of that strategy; we highlighted the area of the wheel ideally covered by it and we specified at which stage of the program it would be carried out and by whom. We delineated six strategies in total called in the following way: The life cycle of upgrading, Beyond upgrading, Productivity of land and housing, City scale coalitions and Past Baan Mankong: learning from Bangkok.
GH
?@ 1.1 c
YYY 1.2 GHGHGH
$
2.1
B 3.1
FGHJFGHJ FGHJFGHJ
2.2 FGHJFGHJ 3.2 2.3
W
X
1.3 1.4
P 2.4 M
GH
$
y
BM
Y 4.1 Y YY YY 4.2 Y
3.3 3.4 3.5
f.A10
4.3
e 1.5
GH
f.A16
GH
2.5
f.A09
f.A17
f.A11
A2. Issues site by site

Housing and space Finance Networks City-scale
Site 1: Chatuchak
Supportive and powerful landowner (Treasury Department) Fear of eviction have pushed to mobilization. Not all the people perceived this as a risk; difficulties to agree in participate in the BM; not willing to be visible (drugs pressures) Parallel upgrading are happening after the floods that make more difficult the decision of joining the programme as raising their floors and moving the edge of the houses 2 mt set back (BMA requirement) Lack of alternatives in the plans limited people to move beyond and find other solutions.
Different fund are used by some communities as as the village fund and flood fund. All communities have savings groups not only for housing; there are some cases of distrust and some people have left them or in other cases the amount of savings is very low in relation with the incomes. Different fund are used by some communities as as the village fund and flood fund.
Strong leadership within the communities that exchange knowledge with other sites. Despite this, it is perceived a lack of communication among the people in the communities. Presence of NULICO and community builders. Canal network that supports in floods and garbage collection, exchange knowledge. In case of Chareochai Nimitmai community (pilot BM project) they are mobilizing other communities under risk of eviction for new express way (a secretly developed project).
Strong attachment to the canals and the location; Canals upgrading: installation of pumping and program of widening the canal to solve the flooding issue by BMA, which can be connected with BM interventions. The canal edge defines the morphology of the community as well as its relationship to the city (other actor can help connect to the city...).
Housing and space

All sites owned by one landowner - Crown Property Bureau; all sites in different stages of Baan Mankong. Area a mixture of old established communities up to 200 years old, and resettled/rehoused groups that invaded the land in the 1990s, coming from different provinces. Different communities at different stages of the program - 2 pilot land-sharing communities, 1 relocated community, 2 ongoing upgrading, and 2 in introductory initial conflictual stage of setting up savings groups. Variable quality of housing, but notably poor quality of temporary housing provided during reblocking/upgrading proved deterrent for some to get involved. No immediate threats and cooperative stance from CPB. CPB control over the overall process, from provision of housing types, as well as administers construction. CPB also decides whether housing should be upgraded versus redeveloped. In conclusion, very limited participation of communities in the design and planning process (mostly consultation based)
Finance
Poorer communities actively encouraged by CPB to organise themselves and form savings groups. Ruamsamakkee; was one of the Baan Mankong pilot sites. However, disintegrated savings subgroups due to conflict and now individual households paying back to the collective. Generally, different savings groups structure in each community, with some addressing other issues beyond housing (such as welfare and economic opportunities). Communities individually active in seeking funding from the district council & the BMA, who have funded infrastructure upgrading and service provision in the area prior to Baan Mankong. Those stakeholders are providing funding through MOU with CPB, whereby the CPB agrees to make squatters legal by giving them addresses so that they can access services and funding for those (electricity and garbage collection).
Networks
Close proximity of neighbouring communities and overwhelming CPB influence surprisingly showed low levels of inter-site networks (conceded that city wide networks not as effective as theyd like) and communication. Potential for common problems to be replicated due to lack of communication (no learning between sites). Immigrant elements of some areas visibly excluded from particpation. Dependence on networking only within the CPB community netwrok and city-wide taskforce, without any such partnerships and formalised knowledge exchange at the district level. Community leaders complained of inefficiency of city-wide taskforce and that they have no time to engage in such long and inefficient meetings
City-scale
Desirable location gives a great amount of economic and livelihood opportunities especially proximity to canal/waterways and market areas. Detached and fragmented neighbourhoods (often partitioned by private property) defy what could be a well integrated and well organised area to develop potential for Baan Mankong (i.e. some nearing completion and some just starting). CPB extremely influential and persuasive. Financial dexterity of local population opens up possibilities of more flexible financing in the future.
Site 2: Wang Thonglang
Housing and space

The process of housing delivery is dependent on a trigger (in this case a fire) to initiate community organisation. There are tensions around typology and density. It can be seen in restrictions emerged from landowner (CPB), but at the same time in multiplicity of options at city scale.
Finance
There is currently a lack of organisation with respect savings groups or basic community finance. CPB has higher standards in terms of costs, related both with standards and the location. In the case of Suan Plu, the level of participation has decreased after the upgrading finished.
Networks
Generally networks exist such as NULICO. However they seem to be inactive on the ground. There are networks around other institutions, as communities in CPB land (i.e, fire fight network). There is some lack of confidence in respect of the flow of information from the leaders.
City-scale
The location of the community impacts on the type of arrangement/negotiations with the landowners eg CPB vs TD Multiplicity around the sites but lack of possibilities imagined by the community.
Site 3: Bang Kho Laem
Housing and space

- Standardisation: Fixed idea among community members of what their house should look like: lack of awareness/imagination of different/alternative typology and plan options
Finance
- Struggled to gain confidence and trust in savings groups (misunderstandings and mistrust among the members of the saving groups resulted in many of them leaving the group)
Networks
- Building trust through pilot project (Kao Noi) > having a tangible example of what BM could do for a community helped the Railway community to regain trust in the project
City-scale
- Strong relationship with local authority/Mayor but uncertainty about the future as term of the mayor has just ended -main focus of city development on clean tourist city what is their place in this?
Site 4: Pattaya
Housing and space
Finance
The leader stole a substantial amount of money from the new community near the beginning - participants reduced as a result from 500 to 60 members. (perhaps this problem is stemming from this more individualised use of BM).
Networks
Networks seem to be distanced from real life in the communitys conceptions. Potential for more comprehensive / deeper learning at city level.
City-scale
Price of land rapidly increasing - due to speculation / new condos etc. BM communities taking the form of gated communities aspiration of being middle class. Risk of supportive mayor not being re-elected. Decisions made at city (samutprakarn) scale (i.e. this is an industrial area and pollution / health problems need to be addressed at this scale)
Site 5: Bang Prong

The second site we studied basically copied the typology of the first precedent site (therefore overlooking the design element). (Only 1 typology used among both communities.) Richer informal dwellers are mobilising across the city (district scale) of Bang Prong to join Baan Mankong - leaving large numbers of more vulnerable, low paid renters (the majority are factory workers) with increased barriers to upgrade. (i.e. bad (or not appropriate) precedents - risk of no more BM projects in the Bang Prong region.
Housing and space
Finance
- In one community, saving group split in 2 groups: those who can afford to build a house, and those who dont. (Consequently part of the site is upgraded and part in slum conditions). - Developed communities have saving groups for different kinds of activity. - Community enterprises as common-income producers (fishery, ponds, plantations, mushroom house).
Networks
- After 2011, a flood network was founded (involves communities, CPB, privates). It has its own fund. Also CODI has a flood fund, and NULICO has 2 flood teams (survey and support). - Generally, good relation with Subdistrict Authority and Province.
City-scale
- Rapid urbanization, land price increasing. Dense neighbourhoods in the middle of rice fields. (Choosing of land driven by affordability, primarily, and access to services.) - Floodplain (affects landprice?) - Fragmented landscape (desakota-like development). - Bounded communities, Gated communities. - Horizon of people limited to community scale (sometimes). - Environmental issues, collaboration with local authority and province for garbage collection / canal cleaning.
Site 6: Nonthaburi
- Communities only involved in planning, not in house design (they get it directly from Subdistrict Authority). No CODI Architects. Widespread standardization and illegal extension - Open space \ common space design often overlooked. - 2011 flooding highlighted vulnerability of communities. Flood-proof design might\should be considered.
A3. Sites diary
f.A12
f.A15. Mapping actors and finances in Rimkhlong Pattahana Bangbua
f.A13. Main findings across the 8 communities
f.A14. Savings group map, Chareonchai Nimitmai community
f.A16. Community story map in Rim Khlong PAWANA ladprao

f.A17. Visualization of one of the alternatives provided to Lang Witthayalaikru Chankasema community
f.A18. Alternative plans provided to Lang Witthayalaikru Chankasema community
f.A19
f.A20. Interviewing community residents and leaders
f.A21. River of life exercise

f.A22. Opportunities and challenges
f.A24. Idea on information sharing_newsletter
f.A23. Rethinking housing design
f.A24
f.A28. Sites location
f.A29. Participatory workshop _ housing f.A26. Participatory mapping _ surrounding areas
f.A27. Participatory mapping_ Children
f.A30. Cover book of ideas
f.A32. Ideas on sharing information
f.A33. Idea working with building interests f.A31. Idea on common space
f.A34
f.A35. Timeline of Kao Noi community derived from the River of Life exercise
f.A37. Map of relocation site, the current activities and the aspirations for the future development
f.A38. Participatory exercise for the welfare houses on the relocation site
f.A36. Actor map, exercise with community leaders
f.A39 Design proposal for the welfare houses
f.A42. River of Life exercise f.A40. Timeline of the Railway community derived from the River of Life exercise
f.A43. Participatory exercise for the site plan
f.A41. Actor map, exercise with community leader
f.A44. Design proposal for the sites with flexible clusters

f.A45
f.A46. Diagram of the Baan Mankong process Bang Prong 1 and 2, and notes
f.A47. Ideas Designing and building together
f.A49. Ideas Designing and building together
f.A48. Bang Prong 2 Process analysis f.A50. Notes from site visits
f.A51
f.A52. Ruamjai Saiyai map
f.A53. Notes of field work

f.A54. Community participatory mapping
f.A55. Community participatory mapping: Thai key
A4. Attended seminars

Presiding our site work, we deepen our knowledge about the case by attending a series of seminars in the CODI offices. DAY 1: 30th of April 2012 Lecture 1: Thailand, Bangkok _ urbanisation and housing development; Nattawut Usavagovitwong Lecture 2: Development plan of Thailand and Bangkok; Wijitbusaba Ann Marome Lecture 4: Housing finance development in Thailand; , Kitti Patpongpibul
f.A57
Lecture 3: Introduction Baan Mangkong; Somsook Boonyabancha.

f.A56
f.A59 Lecture 5: Housing finance of poor informal communities, Somsook Boonyabancha,
f.A58
f.A60
DAY 2: 1th of May 2012 Lecture 1: Politics of change, Somsook Boonyabancha
Lecture 2: Let people be the solution Community architect network (ACHR)
DAY 3: 2th of May 2012 Visit to NHA and NHA projec
f.A61
f.A63
f.A65
Panel discussion: Two community leader,Local authority representative, CODI/BM representative, ACHR representative
Lecture 3: Arsom Slip Institute of the Art
Visit to Private Developer
f.A62
f.A64
f.A66

Imprinting Strategic Alliances Into Space Bangkok, Thailand

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2555/2012 Fieldtrip report MSc Building and Urban Design in Development Development Planning Unit University College London

Imprinting strategic alliances into space Bangkok, Thailand

Imprinting strategic alliances into space Bangkok, Thailand

PAGE 02 | Who we are

PAGE 04 | Table of contents

How to read this report

How to read this report | PAGE 05

PAGE 06 | Executive summary

Executive summary| PAGE 07

Introduction and context

Introduction & context

BANGKOK: the eternal jewel city

PAGE 10 | Introduction and context

Introduction and context | PAGE 11

1.1 WHAT IS TRANSFORMATION?

COLABORATION SPACE: COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION TRANSFORMATION

COLABORATION SPACE: TRANSFORMATION

n f tio el ina s rm te de lic n bonitio m sy cog e r

ed lis ge ca ra lo ve n le io ive at ct iz fe al ef ntr e sc de

1.2 SCALING-UP RECONFIGURED

2. Methodologies and sites

2. Methodologies and sites

PAGE 22 | Methodologies and sites

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 23

2.2 ON THE SITES

site criteria Economic forces

original criteria inside-out

resource access financial provision of resources equity

original criteria Political forces inside-out localised

original criteria Cultural forces inside-out

outside-in descentralization communities into

PAGE 24 | Methodologies and sites

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 25

Community-level actor mapping

f.22 f.20 f.23

Chareonchai Nimitmai Community

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 27

Site-level actor mapping: negociation

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 29

Chatuchak: Diagrammatic site

Site 2: Wang Thonglang

Community-level actor mapping

Kao Pattana Community

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 31

Site-level actor mapping: negociation

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 33

Wang Thonglang Diagrammatic site

Site 3: Bang Kho Laem

Community-level actor mapping

Lung Talad Kao Wat Prayakrai Community

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 35

Site-level actor mapping: negociation

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 37

Bang Kho Laem: Diagrammatic site

Community-level actor mapping

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 39

Site-level actor mapping: negociation

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 41

Pattaya: Diagrammatic site

Site 5: Bang Prong

Community-level actor mapping

Bang Prong 2 Community

Methodologies and sites | PAGE 43