Post-professional architecture and academia: foreword

Architecture is an integral part of human activities and affects everyday experiences and actions. Today architects must face and respond to the challenge of creating built environments that support, nurture, enrich, and celebrate human activities. The creation of cities, towns, and buildings has always been the result of a combination of cultural, social, environmental, and economic factors and needs. New demands require architects to take pro-active responsibility for these factors, and promote designs that support a responsive environment. In addition, social and ethical approaches to the profession, which are amenable to invigorate such a responsibility, need to be considered and acted upon. In response to the continuous transformations of the profession and the changing role of the architect three concepts have emerged in the last three decades: these are programming or pre-designing, post-occupancy evaluation-POE or building performance evaluation-BPE, and community design or user participation (Salama, 2015). Due to client/user dissatisfaction with the built environment and the continuous lack of public awareness of what architects do and how they do it, these concepts must continue to evolve in a responsible manner. While they have not long been part of architectural professional practice, they are now seen as a valid and important part of practice and research in architecture, although not, in practice, fully integrated as a triad. They must be viewed as the basis for social and ethical approaches to architecture since they are characterised by generic qualities that cover a wide range of factors architects must respond to in their practices. Such qualities include the following:

• Identifying human and social needs within the context of the environment in which socio-behavioural, geo-cultural, climatic, political, and economic aspects are employed.
• Evaluating the built environment toward making appropriate adaptations and adjustments.
• Involving people affected by the built environment in the process of decision-making.