Author: Julika Gittner

St Raphael’s Estate: Co Design Redevelopment Workshops – Credit: Brent Council YouTube video

‘This isn’t a ballot, it’s a fix.’ – This article is the second part of two posts on how to resist manipulative resident consultation tactics with the help of art.

Besides the blatant promotion of a YES vote, estate regeneration consultation tool kits often include a whole set of other powerful manipulation techniques aimed at influencing residents’ opinions. These include distorting, decontextualising, misrepresenting or withholding vital information about the estate’s current or proposed social and economic condition as well as overloading residents with reams of meaningless infographics testifying their ‘engagement’ that are intended to create a fictional image of consensus.

To resist these manipulations, it is important to understand some of the basic tricks to look out for and to find ways to produce, represent and disseminate counter evidence. The list is long but for the purpose of this article I will focus on two key vehicles: culture, statistics and withholding of key information. Continue reading →

Author: Julika Gittner

St Raphael’s Estate Co design Workshop 4 – Credit: Brent Council YouTube video

‘This isn’t a ballot, it’s a fix.’ – This article is the first part of two posts on how to resist manipulative resident consultation tactics with the help of art.

Across London residents on social housing estates are being ‘consulted’ on councils’ or private developers’ plans to regenerate their estates. Whether these consultations are conducted to fulfil the statutory requirement to secure GLA funding or as part of private developers’ tick box engagement exercises, all resident consultations are supposed to follow the mayor’s Good practice guide to estate regeneration guidance.

However, the guide’s recommendation for consultations to be ‘meaningful’ and ‘transparent’ (p.12) is a far cry from the reality experienced by residents across the city. Continue reading →