Abstract

In accordance with the author's theory of Architecturally Defined Space (ADS), according to which architecture consists of four basic elements – Environment (natural and social environment), Man, Boundaries and Perspectives – the title of this work “Architecture of Totalitarian Social Systems” suggests architecture in the 'definition' of which the social environment plays a key role, and more specifically – totalitarian social systems. In his book “Architecture in Extreme Climate Conditions” (2021), the Author searched for the relationship between the 'appearance of architecture' (the boundaries of ADS) and the extreme natural environment, and in this work for the relationship between the 'appearance of architecture' (the boundaries of ADS) and the 'extreme social environment' – a totalitarian society. The Author was born, raised and educated (including obtaining his doctoral dissertation, 1988) in the former SFRY, i.e. under the conditions of the communist social system (the so-called 'Yugoslav system of workers' self-management'), which was presented within the SFRY as the 'highest level of social development'. From such a perspective, fascism in Italy (led by Benito Mussolini) and Nazism in Germany (led by Adolf Hitler) were assessed 'as a dark age of civilization', marked by many enormous crimes against other peoples (the Holocaust against the Jews, in the first place). During the architecture studies at the Faculty of Architecture in Sarajevo (1976-1980), architecture from the era of fascism in Italy and Nazism in Germany was 'bypassed', with only a passing mention of the architect Albert Speer 'as Adolf Hitler's architect'. On the other hand, great attention was devoted to 'Russian constructivism' (El Lissitzky, Konstantin Mielnikow, Władimir Tatlin, Alexander Vesnin, Ivan Leonidov...) and 'Russian avant-garde architecture'. Soon avant-garde artists were harassed and even imprisoned, since 1934 the only recognized art expression was 'socialist realism', which was viewed with a similar dioptre as the architecture of Italian fascism and German Nazism. As far as the architecture of socialist North Korea is concerned, it was a completely unknown area, until the visit of Josip Broz Tito, President of the SFRY, to North Korea (August 21, 1977). The then leader of North Korea, Kim Il Sung, gave Tito an impressive welcome and landing at the „Rungrado Stadium on May 1“ in Pyongyang, which was, in many ways, more spectacular than the landings that took place at the „JPA Stadium in Belgrade“ on the occasion of his birthday on May 25. It was then that the Author of this paper first 'saw' something of the architecture of North Korea. After the advent of the Internet made available information 'that was bypassed in some societies', and after testing the theory of Architecturally Defined Space (ADS) through a large number of published books, the Author decided to 'test' this theory also for the case of 'extreme social environment': fascism in Italy, Nazism in Germany, Stalinism in the Soviet Union (USSR) and socialism in North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea).