ABSTRACT
Retopia is a reconstructive utopia which connects a eutopian mental image with the concept of political agency and strategic planning without making any universal claims. Retopias are open-ended society experiments on a local level based on a normative speculative epistemology. This chapter explores how Retopia can develop new forms of society and how it can work as an innovation system for societies. It explores the possible strategies, manifestations, and forms of the retopian innovation system.
As the aesthetic revalidation of Loft Spaces in the 1950s has demonstrated, ruined neighbourhoods can become the locus of social innovation. Through aesthetic and cultural revalidation, the peripheral spaces on the European map can also develop new forms of societies that are based on a variety of society projects and on degrowth. The possibility of free organization and the abundance of space can revive abandoned spaces.
