ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the "Umdenken Umschwenken" as a quintessential example for a paradigm shift and the nascent alternative movement that was driven by a new generation of students and emerging academics based on not only a moral but also an economic argument. It also discusses the different actors in the run-up of the exhibition got involved in formulating a critique that was reinforced by the 1973 oil crisis and concrete practical options. The chapter shows that how both content and design of the exhibition and the accompanying catalog were already conceived as forms of sociopolitical engagement. It describes what extent they had an impact on both the discipline and profession of architecture, and more generally on academia and society. The exhibition "Umdenken Umschwenken" originated in Zurich's academic and to a certain degree alternative milieu of a generation of the socially and politically engaged, which emerged as part of a new social movement that formed around antinuclear protests, combined with environmental issues.
