ABSTRACT

This chapter highlights that while architects have contributed to the recovery of affected people in small-scale, scattered projects, they have been less engaged with the broader landscape of displacement of disasters. It explores the achievements gained from rethinking the traditional role of architects in different cases of post-disaster reconstruction and identifies gaps that persist in these practices. Provider supply has been dominant in disaster reconstruction projects, in particular in the 1980s and 1990s. In the provider supply paradigm, the reconstruction is initiated and developed by an external agency, aimed at providing a solution for a perceived problem— that is, inadequate shelter— and enhancing the efficiency of the intervention. Aided self-built housing presents a shift in practices of architects from the technical and aesthetic domain to an advisory one, with a pedagogic agenda being attached to their role. Aided self-help housing after disasters, however, is rarely funded and realized only in small and scattered projects.