Postcolonial

Discussions
on the
Burnham Plan
Of Manila and
Baguio

Part I

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For a moment in our history, the
style of the Romans suited our
temper perfectly and we created a
structure that had grace and dignity.
The postwar edifice still glows with
the serene spirit of the original and
stands as a memorial to Burnham’s
glorious dream and to the days
when we felt like noble
Romans, gravely founding a
republic.
(Martinez, 2008)
Manila wasn’t always like
this, however. It had a proper
urban plan set out for it
during the American colonial
period, one that would, in my
opinion truly make it the
“Pearl of the Orient.” If it
were followed, the
Burnham Plan for Manila
would have made the
city a wonder to behold.
(Palanca, 2013)
Although the legacy of the Burnham
plan lives with us until today, there
remains the vexing notion of
what Metropolitan Manila could
have evolved into if all phases of
this plan were implemented. To
this day, it remains unfulfilled and
incomplete, a dream that was curtailed
in mid-flight. The exhibit hopes to
revive this vision, as the first step in
improving the future is to
understand the past.
(Alcazaren, 2003)
…its occasionally
extravagant plans were
rarely completed as
proposed and at times
were stopped cold by
resistance from various
sources. (Hunt & DeVries, 2017)
No longer are land-use
changes the only
strategies… used to
accommodate growth.
New debates and
methods have centered
on the issue of
stimulating city and
metropolitan population
and employment growth
…. In the new
lexicon of
“economic
development”,
land planning and
development has
lost the premier
public policy
position it
occupied for so
long in the city of
Daniel Burnham.
(Beauregard, 1989, p.124)
Postcolonial discussions on the
Burnham Plans….
Locating the 'postcolonial' in
the 'urban’
(Yeoh, 2001, p.1)
In recent years, geographers have
made various forays into the
burgeoning literature on
postcolonialism and mined it for
new insights to enrich
geographical concerns. While the
proliferation of uses and implied
meanings of the term 'postcolonial
(and its confusion and conflation
with other terms like 'neo-colonial',
'ex-colonial', 'anti colonial', 'post-
independence' and 'post-imperial')
has resulted in a tangled skein of
intellectual threads… the term has been
also productive of new, if oddly juxtaposed,
simultaneities and relations which,
potentially, could pave the way for new and
broad understandings about the conditions
of our times. A wide range of questions
have been traced, including: in what
ways is the 'postcolonial' framed
by the colonial', and in what ways
does it resist the 'colonial'? Does
the 'postcolonial' simply signify a
movement from the colonial' to the
'neo-colonial’?
 Does it describe a transitory phase and, if
so, what comes after 'post'? In what ways
does postcolonial discourse open up new ways
of understanding the multi directional, mutual
constitution of the 'heart' and 'margins' of
empire and its aftermath?
The postcolonial does not
privilege the colonial.
(Young, 2001, p.4)

The assumption of postcolonial studies is that many of the wrongs,

if not crimes, against humanity are a product of the economic
dominance of the north over the south. (Young, 2001, p.6)

In this account, postcolonialism at best describes

the effects of contemporary social and economic
conditions, but does little either to unearth their
causes or to change their basis. (Young, 2001, p.7)
“… in what ways
is the 'post-
colonial' framed
by the colonial',
and in what ways
does it resist the
'colonial'? Does
the 'postcolonial'
simply signify a
movement from
the colonial' to
the 'neo-
colonial’?”
 In the midst of a protracted and
brutal war against Filipino
nationalists, the United States
colonization of the Philippines
Colonial was rhetorically driven by what
mentality: President William McKinley
USA on the called "benevolent
Philippines assimilation”.
(Rafael, 2020, p.185)
 By invading and occupying the archipelago,
the "earnest and paramount aim" of the
colonizer was that of "win[ning] the
confidence, respect and affection" of the
colonized. Colonization as "assimilation"
Colonial was deemed a moral imperative, as
wayward "Orphans of the Pacific"
mentality: cut off from their Spanish fathers
USA on the and desired by other European powers
Philippines would now be adopted and protected
by the compassionate
embrace of the United States.
(Rafael, 2020, p.185)
The postcolonial does not
privilege the colonial.
(Young, 2001, p.4)
break
The City Beautiful Movement
=
The City of Monuments
Make no little plans. They have
no magic to stir men’s blood….
Daniel Burnham, The Plan of Chicago (1909) p.346

Why always the biggest? I do this to restore

to each individual German his self-respect.
Adolf Hitler, speech to construction workers (1939)
(quoted by Albert Speer, Inside the Third Reich, 1970)

Filipinos want beauty. I have to look beautiful so that the

poor Filipinos will have a star to look at from their slums.
Imelda Marcos (quoted by Veronica Pedrosa, Pedrosa, 2011)
Paris

Emperor:
Napoleon III

Planner/architect:
Georges-Eugene
Haussmann

• Inspired by
London with its
public parks and
wide streets
Paris

Emperor:
Napoleon III

Planner/architect:
Georges-Eugene
Haussmann

• Inspired by
London with its
public parks and
wide streets
(Pinkney, 2019)
Paris

Emperor:
Napoleon III

Planner/architect:
Georges-Eugene
Haussmann https://media.architecturaldigest.com/photos/5b0ef7b575a4f940de3da992/16:9/w_2560%2Cc_limit/GettyImages-
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https://www.hisour.com/haussmanns-renovation-of-paris-31742/
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Paris • Emperor
CLASS
SUMMARY • Empire building and health hazards
PARTICIPATI
• Charismatic, influential, dictatorial ON
planner
• Utilized private enterprise to fund Go to
construction through real estate www.menti.com
and use the code
development 11 31 913.
• Gentrification
Input your
• Created civil unrest which resulted answers to the
question posted.
in the firing of Haussmann
Washington DC
First USA President:
George Washington
Planner:
Pierre L’Enfant

Planning
Commissioner:
Senator McMillan
Member of the
Planning Commission:
Daniel Burnham

‘
In 1791 Pierre L'Enfant placed Congress
on a high point with a
L'Enfant set out to
commanding view of the
create a "magnificent Potomac, instead of
city, worthy of the reserving the grandest spot
nation, free of its for the leader's palace as
colonial origins, and was customary in Europe.
bold in its assertion of ("A Brief History of Pierre L’Enfant
a new identity." and Washington, D.C.", n.d.)
("Planning History", n.d.)
https://www.ncpc.gov/images/1791.jpg
 Burnham became head
of a three-man commission;
the other members were
Frederic Law Olmsted, Jr, and
the New York architect Charles
McKim; later, a sculptor,
Augustus St Gaudens, joined
them. Burnham insisted that
they all went to Europe to
study the finest urban models,
ignoring the obvious irony that
many of these had been
created by the very tyrannies
against which Americans had
revolted.

(Hall, Pérez & Levy, 2014, p.350) https://www.archives.gov/files/about/history/images/building-7351504-l.jpg

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Washington • 1st President/Senate Committee
DC CLASS PARTI-
• Nation Building/Right wrongs of Western
SUMMARY Europe (postcolonial)
CIPATION
• French origin architect, influential,
Go to www.menti.com
uncompromising planner and use the code:
• Utilized state funds and sale of lots 96 85 13 6

• Lack of funding and compromising stance Input your answers to

of L’Enfant got him fired. the question posted.
• Original plan continuously implemented
and improved by succeeding professionals
• State Capital City
break
 The World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago is
What could recognized today as one of the defining moments of American
cultural history. Whether
it marked “the first
have been?
expression of American thought as unity,” as
Burnham vs. Henry Adams believed….
Sullivan ("Burnham, Beaux-Arts, Plan of Chicago, and Fairs | The Art Institute of
Chicago", n.d.)

or:

“The damage wrought by the World’s Fair

will last for half a century from its date, if
not longer. It has penetrated deep into the
constitution of the American mind.”
(Koeper, n.d., quote of Louis Sullivan in, Autobiography of an Idea (1924))
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Successive Indian
administrations viewed them
as an unwelcome reminder of
the yoke of imperialism and
an anti-egalitarian
embarrassment in a country
mindful of the yawning gap
between the rich and poor.
That goal is consistent with
Lutyens’s idea of a planned
city, he said. “You have to
have some sense of
cohesion to urban form,”
Mr. Correa said.
(Kahn, 2007)
END OF PART I