Institutional Design and Public Space: Hegel, Architecture,

and Democracy
J. C. Berendzen

Contemporary political theorists who support conceptions of deliberative

democracy have differing reasons for thinking that political practices should be
organized around public discussion and debate. Some find the theoretical basis for
democratic practices to be deeply rooted in the basic act of communication, while
others might eschew such a justification of democracy but make the instrumental
claim that political decisions can be improved through discussion.1 No matter
what the reason for thinking that democracy should be deliberative, it is not at all
clear that it can be so; the skeptic in most western countries can easily say that it
would be too difficult to arrange a complex and often apathetic citizenry into a
deliberating group.
In this paper, I am going to assume, for the sake of argument, the truth of the
claim that democracy should be deliberative, and focus on one possible discussion
of how democratic societies can be made deliberative. It is commonly assumed
that for deliberative democracy to work, there needs to be vigorous political
debate within the public sphere. Assuming that such public debate is in place,
theorists of deliberation often move to discuss, under the heading of institutional
design, how governmental institutions can be made to better instantiate reasoned
discussion.2 Thus, much of the normative burden of deliberative democracy is put
on a public that is to be in some way spontaneously discursive, and can then
support the more formal deliberative forums.
I would like to argue here that the distinction sketched between open public
debate and designed governmental forums does not get things quite right, insofar
as it overlooks the possibility that more informal parts of the public sphere are still
open to something like institutional design. To put the issue another way, I think
theorists of deliberative democracy should pay more attention to how actual public
space can be organized in such a way that it fosters discourse. Of course, one
needs to be clear on what design means in this case. Theoretical discussions of
institutional design often depend upon procedural conceptions of deliberation,
which specify idealized presuppositions that should govern discourse.3 Using such
procedural frameworks, one can come up with practical proposals that attempt to
marry such ideals with real political conditions.4 Such a conception of design is
rightly not thought to fit the study of the open public sphere, which would not
submit to the same kinds of constraints.

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2008 Blackwell Publishing, Inc.

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But there is a different sense of design that can apply to public space. If we
think of the term design in the common sense associated with architecture, the
point seems obvious. It goes without saying that architects aim to design public
space. In the most basic sense, architecture might provide encouragement for civic
participation by simply providing a public space. But it can do more if it can,
while providing a space for interaction, cause those using the space to reflect on
the democratic interaction itself.
The section on architecture in G. W. F. Hegels Aesthetics provides a unique
discussion of the role that architecture can play in fostering reflection. Hegel
argues that architecture culminates in the gothic church, because of the role the
church plays in supporting and developing the movement of worship that happens
within. Crucially, the activity of worship results in a kind of self-reflection
wherein the community of worshipers see themselves as united with the divine. If
the design of the church can help motivate such reflection in a religious community, perhaps a similar kind of design can help motivate a secular form of reflection
in a democratic community.
To investigate this point, this paper will use the following plan. Part I will
introduce a framework (taken largely from the work of Jrgen Habermas) for
considering the role that the public sphere and civil society play in democratic
deliberation. Part II will give some background information on Hegels Aesthetics,
focusing on the potential problems involved in relating that work to social theory.
Part III will then examine Hegels specific remarks on architecture, and establish
their relevance for the discussion of designing public space. Finally, part IV will
further the discussion of part III by showing how Hegels discussion of the gothic
cathedral can also fit contemporary secular architecture.

I.
This paper will take its initial theoretical orientation from Habermass theory
of democracy, for two main reasons. First, Habermass theory stands as one of (if
not the) most developed and influential conceptions of deliberative democracy.
Furthermore, Habermas is particularly useful for the present discussion, because
his sensitivity to the problem of coupling the impetus of radical democracy with
the facts of social complexity leads him to focus great energy on the discussion of
the public sphere and civil society.
Habermass early works, such as Legitimation Crisis, already argue for the
genuine participation of citizens in the processes of political will formation in a
radically participatory manner.5 But his complete and mature theory of deliberative democracy, presented in Between Facts and Norms, rejects much of this
radicalism. Due to the desire to empirically ground his theory, Habermas rejects
radical democracy as unrealistically idealistic.6 Contemporary societies are too
complex and pluralistic to be directly controlled through democratic processes, so
Habermas seeks to wed the radical democratic impulse to administrative and

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economic spheres that are only indirectly democratic. This leads to what he calls
the two-track conception of democracy.7
Democratic theory should keep the public sphere and formal state/
administrative institutions separate, such that deliberative politics proceeds along
two tracks that are at different levels of opinion- and will-formation, the one
constitutional, the other informal.8 As it turns out, however, Habermass view is
much more complex, as shown when he discusses democracy in terms of a
center and periphery. At the center are the familiar institutional complexes of
administration, and at the periphery is the public sphere. These two tracks are
complicated first by the existence of an inner periphery of institutions that are
not fully governmental but have been delegated authority by the state (Habermas
mentions, for example, universities and public insurance systems). Also, the outer
periphery consists both of groups or organizations of varying levels of formal
integration (such as unions, public interest groups, and churches) and more
broadly informal forums (such as coffee houses and public squares) where public
discussion might take place. Opinions formed in all of the various parts of the
outer periphery then pass through sluices to the center (sometimes directly,
sometimes via the inner periphery) such that the center is steered by the outer
peripherys democratic influence.9
It is noteworthy that precisely because of the emphasis he puts on the fact that
societies cannot be entirely democratic, Habermas thinks the periphery has to be as
radically democratic as possible. If it is not, democracy fails, because there is no
counter-steering mechanism that influences the center. This requires there to be
an energetic civil society, separate from both state and economic influence, driving
the public sphere. This civil society is a narrower component of that public sphere:
Civil society is composed of those more or less spontaneously emergent associations,
organizations, and movements that, attuned to how societal problems resonate in the private
life spheres, distill and transmit such reactions in amplified form to the public sphere.10

In order to effectively influence the rest of the public sphere, such that the whole
periphery can properly influence the center, the elements that compose
civil society must have fluid temporal, social, and substantive boundaries and
together form a wild complex that resists organization as a whole.11 Such a
wild and anarchic structure is necessary because in order to influence the center,
discourse at the periphery needs to have the capacity to perceive, interpret, and
present society-wide problems in a way that is both attention catching and innovative.12 This entails two points. First, regulation would in many cases limit the
topics debated and the voices heard at the debate, so civil society would not
present society wide problems. But also, regulation would run the risk of stifling
the creative impulses necessary for attention catching innovation.
Because Habermass view so emphasizes a vigorous civil society and public
sphere, it is clearly dependent on the idea that the citizens that make up that
society are actually motivated to engage in such wild discourse. Habermas notes

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in Between Facts and Norms that this is a problematic assumption, and he already,
in an earlier text, asserted that uncoupled from concrete, everyday ethical life,
moral insights can no longer simply be assumed to have the motivational force that
would allow them to have a practical effect.13 Clearly, taking part in public
deliberation requires what Habermas is here calling a moral insight; while one
might be motivated at times to take part in democratic processes out of pragmatic
or instrumental motives, the kind of robust participatory democracy Habermas
envisions can only work when a large number of citizens desire to work toward
collective aims. It is at the point of considering how such moral insights can be
reconnected with everyday ethical life (or some postconventional stand-in for that
ethical life) that the possibility for designing civil society arises.
If we overemphasize Habermass talk of civil society being wild or anarchic, and thus place the normative burden on a spontaneously democratic citizenry, we miss a crucial opportunity to investigate how the public sphere can be
designed so democratic practice is better integrated with our everyday lives. Claus
Offe, for instance, argues such a point, and proposes to overcome this lacuna with
research into the role that associative relations play in supporting public discourse. Offe admits that the notion of associative relations is vague, but provisionally defines it as encompassing social commonalities and differences that
take institutional forms, as well as processes of conflict resolution among social
categories of people.14 These relations help link citizens moral orientations with
democratic practices. This leads to Offes strong hypothesis:
Where empirical associative relations do not favor or at least make affordable moral
considerations . . . a societys legal, constitutional, and socialization conditions may well
be highly developed; but in the absence of corresponding institutions representing collective identities and associative bearers of the moral point of view, the potential of moral
capacities will still not be realized, let alone exhausted . . . a common language, a common
public sphere, and a shared lifeworld are too weak to release the potential for acting in
solidarity.15

Associative relations provide the necessary context for fostering solidarity

beyond what mere shared language and space can provide. Thus, such associations motivate people to take part in democratic interaction. Offe is a bit ambivalent in discussing the form of these relations, however. On the one hand, he seems
to want to focus on postconventional forms of association that do not depend on
a strong communal identity or ethos. On the other hand, he does not move the
discussion beyond the forms of solidarity that are shaped by relations such as
religion, national identity, and kinship.
Can we support citizens normative orientation to democracy without anchoring it in such strong forms of community? It may be true that relations such as
kinship can foster democratic interaction. But contemporary pluralistic societies
simply cannot have a single shared ethos, and a stress on community can have the
deleterious effect of limiting the voices that can be heard in a debate. This is part
of the point of Habermass discussion of social complexity, so his theory is not

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helpfully amended by a proposal to find democratic solidarity in conventional

identities. The question, then, is how we can have a civil society in which there is
some collective orientation toward discussion and debate without having that
orientation be derived from some kind of restrictive identity or ethos?
For Habermas, part of the answer is that every citizen be socialized into a
common political culture which supports a constitutional patriotism that heightens an awareness of both the diversity and the integrity of the different forms of
life coexisting in a multicultural society.16 Citizens need to see themselves as
members of a culture that takes the values and procedures of democracy to heart,
and take patriotic pride in that culture. But such a view has a number of potential
flaws. First, it is not clear that it is an actual answer to the motivation problem,
insofar as one can further ask how people are motivated to care, patriotically,
about democratic procedures. Furthermore, democratic principles have a universalist quality that seems to be different from the particular, closely felt qualities of
conventional associations, so it is not clear that they can generate the same kinds
of feelings. Part of Habermass answer to such concerns is that democratic values
have to be tied to actual institutions and practices that people directly experience,
and thus they are made in some sense motivating and particular.17 But in that case,
one has to wonder if people feel pride in those practices because of the values and
principles embedded in them, or because the symbols and celebrations (like those
associated with the Fourth of July) attached to them are vague replacements for
conventional identities.
Part of this problem can be alleviated when one notes that for Habermas, a
constitution is taken to be more than a set of laws, principles, or institutions. It
is a project, or a practice of realizing the system of rights anew in changing
circumstances . . . to institutionalize it more appropriately, and to draw out its
contents more radically.18 Along these lines, Habermas approvingly cites Ulrich
Preusss definition of constitution as a process through which a society gradually overcomes its inability to engage in normative reflection on itself, which
requires institutional forms that support such reflection.19 So constitutional patriotism, on this consideration of constitution, should not merely be an act of
valuing or identification, but taking part in an institutionally supported activity. By
engaging in that activity, people come to see themselves as a part of a society
united through democratic procedures embedded in that very activity, so it
involves, in two interrelated senses, collective self-reflection. First, the object of
reflection is the collective; citizens reflect on the role they play within the constitutional community. But also because citizens take part in the constitutional
process with others in the community, a collective process leads to the act of
reflection. These two senses should strengthen one another; the fact that a collective act leads to reflection on the community enhances the reflective activity, and
this in turn leads individuals to further engage in the collective process.
Of course, this does not answer the question of how people come to have such
patriotism, nor has the exact character of the constitutional project been
specified. It is important to note, however, that asking how one can involve citizens

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in a process is different from asking how one can get citizens to identify with a set
of values. And it is in answering the former question that public architecture,
particularly taken in Hegelian fashion, becomes crucially important. If a vibrant
public sphere requires processes of democratic interaction that foster normative
reflection, there will, literally, have to be spaces where that process takes place,
and architecture can provide them. What is not as obvious, but what Hegel can
teach us, is that architecture can go further by playing a role in the process itself.
Or, to put another way, architecture can help bring us to a kind of normative
self-reflection, as Hegels discussion in his Aesthetics, when interpreted in a
contemporary light, can show. But before looking at Hegels discussion of architecture, we should consider issues in the Aesthetics that might inhibit its use for
social theory.
II.
That Hegels Aesthetics is pertinent for discussions of the design of public
space seems prima facie odd, because the whole of the text moves against social
theory in two ways. First, Hegel seems to want to remove the discussion of social
interactions from the discussion of art, because art should not be subordinate to
other ends. Second, Hegel argues that as the art forms develop, they move toward
increasing subjective interiority, possibly in opposition to intersubjective social
concerns.
Arts autonomy clearly precludes it from engaging in direct moral instruction,
but it is not clear that art is wholly separated from social concerns. For Hegel, art
must follow its own particular vocation, which is to unveil the truth in the form
of sensuous artistic configuration.20 Because of this, art should not be subordinated to ends that are outside of that sensuous configuration. Therefore, it should
not be used as a vehicle for moral instruction and improvement (i.e., in the form
of propaganda). Following on this point, Hegel thinks that any moral drawn from
art is too dependent on circumstances external to the work of art for its interpretation. Furthermore, the attempt to attach art to moral instruction misses the fact
that both morality and art are encompassed by a higher aim. As Hegel explains it,
morality involves the combination of the universal with sensuous particularity, and
this is an example of the reconciliatory project ushered in by the overall thoroughgoing cleavage between what is absolute and what is external reality and
existence.21 Art must be seen as playing its own role within this greater reconciliatory project, specifically in terms of presenting the concept sensuously. Subordinating art to a social function would seemingly involve misplacing arts role
in this greater development.
So to put the point in Hegels terms, since . . . moral betterment . . . has
pointed to a higher standpoint, we will have to vindicate this higher standpoint for
art too.22 Art is autonomous insofar as it plays its own, peculiarly sensuous, role
in the development of Spirit, but since Hegel sees art as necessarily tied to that
development he is critical of aestheticist views that calls for regarding art for

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arts sake.23 Given that such a development involves moral and social concerns,
the two are broadly linked with art. One should not mistake Hegels arguments
for arts autonomy, or his arguments against using art in a facile way as a blunt
conveyance for moral teachings, as an argument for arts complete separability
from the social. The two move in the same orbit.
Of course, this does not link art with any particular social concern, and
even if arts supposed claim to autonomy is set to the side the fact remains that
Hegel sees art as moving toward interiority, which might still present a problem
for the attempt to use his views within social theory. This movement toward
interiority becomes most clear in part 2 of the Aesthetics, which explains the
historical development of the arts into the three art forms (symbolic, classical,
and romantic). There, Hegel describes a progression that culminates in the
romantic form precisely because of its increased interiority, as the true content
of romantic art is absolute inwardness. For example, under the heading of
chivalry, he explains how honor, love, and fidelity all play a role in romantic
art. The three of these feelings (particularly love, given its role in Hegels
other works) would seem to include an inherent social content, but Hegel tells
us that they are to be thought of as not strictly ethical qualities . . . but only
forms of the romantic self-filled inwardness of the subject.24 Furthermore, as
romantic art develops beyond its early stages, even these ambiguously ethical
qualities drop out and art displays a more pure inwardness. This same development is seen in the discussion of architecture. The most properly romantic
form of architecture Hegel discusses is found in the gothic cathedral, and its
most prominent aspect is the way the design of the church supports the interior
movement of self-reflection that is involved in the practices of worship that take
place within.
Following this point, many, including Habermas, would probably find the
Aesthetics to not have much relevance for social theory, at least insofar as the
lectures on art date from Hegels late period, when the mentalistic account of self
and self-consciousness takes over.25 Habermass views are representative of an
interpretation that sees Hegels early work as containing important social insights
that are overshadowed by his later idealism. In his early Jena period, Hegel
describes the achievement of self-consciousness as only possible through processes of mutual recognition, where through relationships with others (love being
paradigmatic) we come to have a view on ourselves.26 But such an emphasis on
social life implied a kind of dependence on specific social contexts that could not
provide the robust notions of objectivity and universal rationality that Hegel was
after. As Habermas puts it, even the collective spirit of an ideally enlarged
community including all human beings would be marked by finite features and
constraints of its intersubjective constitution, and this motivated Hegels move to
ground the system in the absolute.27 For such grounding, all elements of history,
including the development of art and architecture, must become part of one grand
project of self-reflection described in terms of the internalizing acts of one largescale subject.28

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Of course, one can argue with Habermass interpretation, and the point here
is not to endorse his view. But he does pose an important challenge. One way to
meet the challenge in the present context, rather than arguing for an alternate
interpretation of Hegels system, is to show that Hegels overarching aims do not
indelibly mark all aspects of his works. Yes, the overall scheme of the Aesthetics
fits with Hegels idealism, but we should not let that occlude the finer points of
what he actually says about the various arts. A key contention here is that Hegels
specific comments on architecture, especially gothic churches, swing at least
partly free of his grander aims. When one looks at what he says about gothic
churches, it turns out that the form of reflection that takes place in the church has
social connotations. Those connotations, when drawn out and interpreted in a
contemporary context, can show how architecture can help develop and support
the kind of reflection necessary to a postconventional democratic culture.
III.
Hegels discussion of architecture can seem a bit muddled because of the way
it incorporates the development of the art forms. We are told, for example, that
architecture corresponds primarily to the symbolic form, because the meanings
implanted in architecture can in general indicate only in the externals of the
environment that it creates.29 Hegel understands the symbolic in the very straightforward sense of a mere sign that expresses a meaning arbitrarily, and he uses
as an example flags, the colors of which symbolize a nation although there is
nothing inherently linking nation and color.30 He, thus, sees architecture as being
only arbitrarily connected to the meanings it expresses.
Of course, he goes on to separate periods of architecture according to all three
art forms as well, so there are forms of symbolic architecture, classical architecture, and romantic architecture. Architecture is marked overall as symbolic, but is
also differentiated according to the three forms. As Hegel puts it, while . . . architecture in its fundamental character remains throughout of a symbolic kind, still
the artistic forms . . . are its determinants at different stages.31 Thus, there is
romantic architecture, for instance, but its character is always generally symbolic.
Or so Hegel says. As we examine the social aspects of architecture, this way of
construing architecture will seem inadequate. In fact, Hegel shows romantic
architecture, in the form of the gothic cathedral, to link meaning to form in
something more than a symbolic or arbitrary way, and this is one way in which his
comments on actual architectural works seem to detach from his broader scheme.
The earliest, symbolic or independent, form of architecture is already
described in the Aesthetics as having a directly social function, insofar as it
provides a unifying point for a nation or nations. In this regard, Hegel discusses
temples that use solid towers, obelisks, phallic columns, and other sculpture-like
buildings that act as social organizing points.32 Here we find architecture linking
up with the public in the most obvious sense, insofar as the buildings provide a
general space for people to gather. Their character as architecture is not what

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carries that social meaning, however, because the form of the building is a more
or less arbitrary exemplar of that meaning. So while symbolic architecture might
suit the obvious social purpose of providing social space, it does not suit the
deeper purpose of developing and strengthening social interaction, because its
form is only arbitrarily linked to what happens within.
Like symbolic architecture, classical architecture suits a social purpose,
insofar as temples and other public buildings carve out a public space. And this
social purpose is still largely external to the architecture itself. Classical architecture begins to surpass the symbolic because it moves away from the representation
of organic forms into its own proper medium as a geometrically ordered structure
ordered according to the laws of gravity.33 But this comes at a price; while
classical architecture becomes more autonomous by shedding a great measure of
its abstract symbolism, it becomes more and more subservient to the external
purpose of providing shelter. A column in a classical structure displays more
autonomy insofar as it no longer primarily symbolizes the divinity of the suns
rays, as an ancient obelisk might, or political power, as a freestanding phallic
column might. It suits the more properly architectural purpose of bearing weight;
but, then again, this merely suits the purpose of putting a roof over someones
head.
This is not the case, however, with romantic architecture, as seen in the gothic
church. In these buildings, the form moves away from displaying its slavery to
gravity and begins to mirror the meaning of the activity that happens within. This
mirroring is dependent on two main aspects of gothic design. First, the structure
is much more differentiated in its aspects than the classical building. This can be
seen, for example, in the structural differences between the chancel, transepts, and
nave, and in the multitude of pillars forming various arches that Hegel compares
to branches intertwining in a forest. But this lack of geometrical regularity is not
disordered. In uniting such diverse design elements, Hegel also takes the romantic
building to embody a kind of complex, internally differentiated whole.34 Second,
the pointed arch gives the church a kind of lightness and upward movement.
Because the arch flows upward directly from the pillars, there does not appear to
be any particular load that the pillars carry, and the way the building strives
upward precisely converts load carrying into the appearance of free ascending.35
How do these two elements mirror the meaning of the activity happening
within? To understand this we need to understand something of Hegels views on
the form of Christian devotion that takes place in worship.36 Initially, the worshipers who use the church are restless, and in some sense internally fragmented
because they cannot reconcile their particular existence with Gods infinity. This
restlessness and fragmentation is mirrored by the complexity and diversity of the
churchs design. But, crucially, just as that design is found to actually unite that
diversity, the worshipers eventually move to see themselves unified in some way
with the infinite. The upward striving of the church, which displays the elevation
toward the infinite, mirrors this movement. In this regard, Hegel says that when in
the church,

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The eye sees, on the one hand, the most obvious outlines clearly ordered, though in
immense dimensions, and on the other hand an unsurveyable abundance and variety of
decorative ornamentation, so that what is most universal and simple faces the most diversified particularity of detail. Christian devotion involves a similar contrast: the heart that
worships is nevertheless immersed in finitude and habituated to pettiness and minutiae.
This disunion should stimulate reflection and this striving upwards invites a sense of the
sublime.37

In this way, the form of the church is congruent with the content, and thus
romantic architecture seems to move beyond the merely symbolic.
But the relation between form and content in this instance goes beyond mere
mirroring or congruence. The church actually supports, strengthens, and plays a
role in the movement of devotion. The gothic church is built to hold a congregation
and enclose a space of worship, but it does so with a grandeur and variety of detail
that raises it above the merely utilitarian. This is, crucially, due to the fact that the
building is literally meant to help give a shape to the development of spirit:
[Christian devotion] essentially implies a reconciliation of differences into a single unity
that has become inherently concrete. At the same time, romantic architecture constructs a
building which exists as an enclosure for the spirit, and consequently it is its business, so
far as is architecturally possible, to make spiritual convictions shine through the shape and
arrangement of the building.38

Supporting and making the movements of spirit concrete is inherent in, not
ancillary to, the architectural work. Thus, it really no longer seems fair for Hegel
to say that architecture is always marked by the symbolic.
For our purposes, though, what is most important about the foregoing discussion is that Hegel thinks the form of the church links to the meaning of
devotion precisely insofar as the design of the church plays a role in fostering
reflection in the worshiping subject:
Romanticism has as its principle the inner life, the return of the intellectual life into itself,
but the inner life is to be reflected into the external world and to withdraw into itself out of
that world. Now in architecture it is the visible, material, and spatial mass on which the
inmost heart itself is so far as possible to be brought before contemplation.39

Architecture, thus, aids the movement of the inner life into the external world and
back again. Here the gothic church is a call to the mind and spirit, and this call,
which comes from the design, is answered by the worship that takes place within
its confines.
For the purposes of connecting this discussion to social theory, however, this
elevation of architecture in the romantic seems to come at a price. The meaning
that is expressed in the gothic cathedral is intimately tied to the romantic movement toward inwardness, which might tie it to the large-scale mentalist subject
Habermas decries. At this point, it is crucial, however, to more fully investigate

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what Hegel means by devotion, and what interiority implies in the case of
such devotion. In this regard, the Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion, which
date from roughly the same period as the Aesthetics, should be helpful.40 In both
texts, Hegel describes devotion as being a part of the cultus, or external religious
practices.41 Devotion itself is described, in the religion lectures, in subjectivist
terms. Hegel refers to it as a form of thinking that does not completely grasp
conceptual relations, but which brings God, as the infinite, present for me. But
this involves self-reflection; I reflect back upon myself . . . I distinguish myself
both from this object and from this pure thinking attitude of mine.42 This reflection begins to look like the first sense of collective reflection mentioned above
insofar as one sees oneself as connected to the divine; the object of reflection
moves beyond the self to the connection of the self to something larger.
But the second sense of collective reflection, reflection spurred through a
collective act, also comes into play in the cultus. The cultus is spoken of in
connection with the Being of the Community, and it is found in the practical,
active aspects of the religious community, such as in the observance of sacraments.43 To become a community in the fullest sense, the institution of the church
requires the activity of the cultus, and the preservation of the community . . . is a
continuous activity that creates the community, forming it and bringing it forth.44
The cultus, in the form of religious practices such as sacraments, is this communal
activity. And Hegel says of this practice:
The Spirit fills its community; it is brought to sensible awareness that each singular
subjectivity, this particular individual, is a member of the community, i.e. that God is in it
and that it is in God . . . This immense elevation and exaltation of the individual comes to
consciousness.45

So the interiority that the movement of reflection results in includes the awareness
of membership in a community united in God. This notion of the communal as
interior is repeated in Hegels general discussion of the forms of spirit present in
religion, which culminate in absolute singularity. This is the form of return
from appearance into itself or absolute presence to self. Hegel goes on to
describe this stage as the inner place, the community, first of all in the world, but
also the community insofar as it simultaneously raises itself to heaven.46 Given a
common understanding of subjectivity and interiority, it is clearly idiosyncratic
to say that the interior is in the community. But what this seems to hinge on, for
Hegel, is the idea that in collective worship the members of the community see
themselves as together with the divine. So the two senses of collective reflection
come together to support one another; the cultus, which involves a collective
process, is necessary to create the inner community. That community is inner
insofar as there is a kind of self-reflection, but it is reflection on the collective, and
is developed through collective acts.
This communal element of the cultus is downplayed in the Aesthetics. Hegel
does describe the cathedral as having something of a social purpose, insofar as it

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serves a large congregation. But the way in which the architecture of the cathedral
is described as drawing the congregation together as a community is unsatisfying;
he notes that the entire community can be housed in the cathedral and engage
in diverse pursuits that are simultaneously lost in the grandiose structure of the
building.47 But given the discussion of worship taken from the Lectures on the
Philosophy of Religion, the movement toward interiority expressed in the Aesthetics no longer seems to bar links to social theory. If the gothic church supports
the movement of reflection that results in interiority as the Aesthetics suggest, and
the interiority that results from devotion is a communal interiority as the Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion suggest, then the gothic church supports a
form of communal interiority. Put in other terms, the gothic church supports a
communal process that develops self-reflection in the worshipers on the role they
play in forming that community, which is united in the divine.
Of course, more fully understanding this form of community would require
that we more fully understand what Hegel means by the divine, and this would
further push toward a discussion of Hegels overarching system. But what if we
were to drop the divine, yet preserve the rest of the foregoing discussion? Could
we describe a form of architectural design that supports and develops a form of
self-reflection, in those within that architectural space, on the role they play in
forming a community that is united with something else? The answer of the next
section is yes; we can conceive of a form of secular architecture that develops
Hegels point in this way, seeing the community united not under the divine, but
under what Habermas calls a constitutional project.
IV.
Earlier it was noted that for Habermas, the constitutional project is the
process of a society progressively realizing, and even radicalizing, democratic
rights in its institutions, and that this process requires a form of self-reflection on
the part of societys citizens. Thus, democratic values become progressively
ensconced in a given society as the members of that society come to see themselves as taking part together in a democratic project. On Hegels description, the
architecture of the gothic church supports and strengthens the ability of those who
worship inside it to see themselves as part of a community joined under the divine.
What needs to be shown is that an analogous form of architecture can support and
strengthen the ability of citizens to see themselves as a part of a community joined
by a democratic project.
While such a move takes crucial inspiration from Hegel, it also necessarily
goes beyond his intentions. This is first suggested by the fact that Hegel was more
or less dismissive of secular gothic architecture, and thus denies the most obvious
avenue wherein one might construe his view in secular terms.48 An examination of
contemporary architecture, however, should show important points of congruence
with Hegels discussion of the gothic church. Of course, this will move us beyond
Hegels own views. While parts of his work (e.g., his theory of recognition) may

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hold insights for contemporary democratic and communicative views, Hegel

himself was not a deliberative democrat.49 Nonetheless, Hegels discussion of
gothic architecture can teach us a great deal about what might be thought of as a
contemporary democratic architecture.
A variety of buildings completed in the past ten years display significant
design elements that operate analogously to those that Hegel finds in the gothic
church. These buildings also stand out as public spaces that play a role in fostering
democratic reflection. Importantly, they do not present any particular ethos or
communal identity; they rather present open spaces wherein various ideas can
meet. Perhaps, none of the buildings are, individually, perfect examples of the
ideal kind of architecture being proposed. But taken together, they should show
that public space could be designed to help inculcate constitutional patriotism.
To see this, we can consider Diamond Ranch High School in Pomona, California,
the Seattle Central Library, and the Salt Lake City Main Library.
Diamond Ranch High School, designed by Thom Mayne and his firm, Morphosis, seems radically different from any gothic cathedral. But below the surface
are a number of connections. First, the design seems to free itself of the dictates
of gravity to an extent that far surpasses the gothic cathedral, with highly distorted
roof and wall geometries. Also, the complex spatial arrangements of the campus
resemble the complex differentiation of the gothic cathedral. The basic form
of two rows of buildings divided by a pedestrian street is fairly simple. But each
row is further divided into a crisscrossing pattern that forms various courtyards
and meeting spaces. This pattern is emphasized by the unusual geometries of
the individual buildings themselves. As architect Alice Kimm describes it, this
crisscrossing has the effect of splitting the building lines into smaller fragments . . . creating various types and sizes of communal spaces.50
As is the case with the gothic cathedral, this differentiation is not arbitrary.
Rather, it is meant to mirror the complexities of contemporary social organization. This turns the campus into a complex and differentiated whole which in
turn houses a complex and differentiated student body, and the former is meant
to inspire and facilitate the interactions of the latter. Ideally, the very form of
the campus motivates the students to interact, and through those interactions
they are brought to realize that the school, as a social system, depends on that
interaction.51
Of course, a public school forms only a semi-public space, given that it is a
relatively closed and controlled social system (which in Habermass terms would
be in the inner periphery). For a building that falls further toward the outer
periphery, consider the Seattle Central Library, designed by Rem Koolhaass
Office of Metropolitan Architecture. Like Diamond Ranch, the Seattle Central
Library expands on and radicalizes the complex spatial arrangements and gravitydefying geometries of the gothic church. It does so by encapsulating a series of
staggered levels inside an irregular glass and steel-mesh outer shell. New York
Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp evocatively describes the designs
effect:

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J. C. Berendzen

At first glance, the irregular angles, folds and shapes seem arbitrary. The buildings
structure is hard to discern . . . This plays tricks with the eyes, making it nearly impossible
to register the buildings scale accurately . . . Tapered facets create the effect of forced
perspective, altering the apparent dimensions of the building envelope. Planes that initially
look rectangular are seen on closer inspection to be trapezoidal.52

Muschamp then goes on to explain that this seemingly difficult spatial arrangement is what best suits the purpose of the buildings use as a library, so, like
Diamond Ranch and the gothic church, the complexity is not arbitrary. This is
supported by the discussion of the building in Library Journal, which gives a
positive review of the buildings actual use as library. Crucially, the review
highlights that a main part of the buildings purpose is to create a public space, and
glowingly praises its Living Room area that comes closer to the ancient Greek
agoraan open space in a town, a meeting placethan perhaps any other public
room in America.53
It is such an effective public space because it goes beyond providing mere
space. The awe-inspiring design of the building causes users of the library to feel
that they are taking part in an important public gathering; for Witold Rybczynski,
the feeling of space creates an exhilarating public room.54 Perhaps more importantly, as one Seattle resident describes it, the place is alive. It makes you feel
youre in on something, and not something that began recently and will fade away,
but the electricity of long-term knowledge-gathering.55 The design seemingly has
the power to cause those who engage in the collective act of using the building to
reflect on the very fact that one is engaged in a communal effort (thus the feeling
that one is in on something).
The Seattle Central Library has been criticized, however, for not being sufficiently accessible from the street, such that it does not tie in well enough to the
city around it.56 No matter what the effect when inside, if getting people inside
is a problem, this would clearly be a hindrance to its public use. Given this
possibility, it is important to see that architectural design can tie buildings
directly to open public spaces, as is the case with the Salt Lake City Main
Library, designed by Moshe Safdie. The wedge-shaped building sits in the
corner of the public, city block sized Library Square. The side facing the square
is dominated by a five-story glass wall, while a six-story wall curves out from
the opposite side of the building to become a pedestrian pathway. The pathway
spirals out from the top of the building and slopes down toward the square
below, allowing users to walk from the square to the librarys rooftop garden. In
this way, the building not only looks out onto, but literally embraces the public
square in which it is situated.
The Library Square has been called a place where citizens practice democracy, and numerous civic groups use the buildings meeting spaces. And the
buildings design clearly motivates this activity; Nancy Tessman, the librarys
director, suggests that the building reflects the idea of an open mind because of
its spiral shape. It helps those who use it to take a 360 view of the city that
surrounds it, particularly as they climb the curved ramp. According to Tessman,

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Safdie really understood that the community had told us they wanted greater
perspective for all citizens, a more open-minded, generous appreciation of the
diversity here.57 The librarys design, thus, draws people together to engage in
public events that provide them with a means to view themselves as a part of the
greater context of the city. Thus, it can help spur collective reflection in both
senses.
In each of these three cases, the buildings have a complex, internally differentiated structure that seems to move beyond the constraints put on architecture by
gravity. In this regard, they are like the churches Hegel describes, though they
achieve such an effect through means other than the pointed arch or gothic
ornamentation. More importantly, however, in each case this complex and challenging design suits the purpose of motivating those who use the buildings to
engage in a collective form of reflection. While the gothic church orients the
reflection of the community toward the divine, the contemporary buildings lead
users to reflect on their place in the civil community served by that building.
Diamond Ranch mirrors and supports its complex student body, the unusual
grandeur of the Seattle Central Library causes users to feel themselves to be a part
of a larger project of sharing knowledge, and the Salt Lake City Main Librarys
spiraling design motivates those who use the building to see themselves tied to the
public square and to the greater city. These effects should be taken as cues for
thinking about how further architectural projects might openly support the public
in reflecting upon its own democratic interactions, and thus help support the
constitutional project.
If more of our public spaces are designed to motivate us in this way, constitutional patriotism could be made a more concrete part of our everyday lives.
The point of discussions of institutional design is to show how governmental
institutions can be made more democratic and open to debate. The discussion of
public architecture is meant to provide just one small example of how that basic
aim can be applied to the public sphere as well. If this kind of informal institutional design is paired with the more formal sense of institutional design, it
should bolster our investigations into how we can go about making our democracies more vigorously deliberative.

Notes
1

For the former see Jrgen Habermas, Between Facts and Norms: Contributions to a Discourse Theory
of Law and Democracy (hereinafter BFN), trans. William Rehg (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
1996). For the latter, see the essays in Deliberative Democracy, ed. Jon Elster (Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1998).
2
See Peter Levine, The New Progressive Era: Toward a Fair and Deliberative Democracy (Lanham,
MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2000); James Fishkin, Democracy and Deliberation:
New Directions for Democratic Reform (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991) and
Designing Democratic Institutions: NOMOS XLII, ed. Ian Shapiro and Stephen Macedo (New
York: New York University Press, 2000).

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3

J. C. Berendzen

See Joshua Cohen, Deliberation and Democratic Legitimacy, in Deliberative Democracy: Essays
on Reason and Politics, ed. James Bohman and William Rehg (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
1997).
4
Cf. n. 2.
5
Habermas, Legitimation Crisis, trans. Thomas McCarthy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1975), 36.
6
BFN, 287302.
7
For an review of the two-track scheme and its connection to Habermass earlier views, see James
Bohman, Public Deliberation: Pluralism, Complexity, and Democracy (Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press, 1996), 17281.
8
BFN, 314.
9
Ibid., 35456.
10
Ibid., 367.
11
Ibid., 307.
12
Ibid., 358.
13
See ibid., where he says that it is problematic to assume that the periphery has the capability for
generating communicative power. The earlier text is Habermas, Wie ist Legitimitt durch
Legalitt mglich?, Kritische Justiz, 20, no. 1 (1987): 116, quoted in Claus Offe, Bindings,
Shackles, Brakes: On Self-Limitation Strategies, in Modernity and the State: East, West, trans.
Barbara Fultner (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996), 54.
14
Offe, Bindings, Shackles, Brakes, 42.
15
Ibid., 46.
16
Habermas, Citizenship and National Identity, appendix II in BFN, 500.
17
For a sympathetic overview of Habermass notion of constitutional patriotism, which also considers
various criticisms, see Ciaran Cronin, Democracy and Collective Identity: In Defense of Constitutional Patriotism, European Journal of Philosophy 11, no. 1 (2003): 128.
18
BFN, 384.
19
Ibid., 444; citing Ulrich Preuss, Verfassungstheoretische berlegungen zur normativen Begrndung
des Wohlfahrtsstaates, in Sicherheit und Freiheit: Zur Ethik des Wohlfahrtsstaates, eds. Sache
and Engelhardt (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1990), 73.
20
G.W.F. Hegel, Aesthetics: Lectures on Fine Art (hereinafter ALFA), trans. T.M. Knox (Oxford:
Clarendon Press, 1975), 55.
21
Ibid., quotes on 52 and 53 respectively.
22
Ibid., 55.
23
See William Desmond, Gothic Hegel, Owl of Minerva, 30, no. 2 (Spring 1999): 23752.
24
ALFA, quotes on 519 and 553 respectively.
25
Habermas, From Kant to Hegel and Back Again: The Move Toward Detranscendentalization, in
Truth and Justification, trans. Barbara Fultner (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003), 205.
26
On this point see Habermas, Labor and Interaction: Remarks on Hegels Jena Philosophy of Mind,
in Theory and Practice, trans. John Viertel (Boston: Beacon Press, 1973), 14269.
27
Habermas, From Kant to Hegel and Back Again, 199202, quote on 202.
28
Habermas, Some Difficulties in the Attempt to Link Theory and Praxis, in Theory and Practice,
trans. John Viertel (Boston: Beacon Press, 1973), 13.
29
ALFA, 632.
30
Ibid., 304.
31
Ibid., 634.
32
Ibid., 63740, 65455, quote on 637.
33
Ibid., 660.
34
Ibid., 68490.
35
Ibid., 689.
36
In ALFA worship and devotion are problematic. Worship usually translates Andacht. But
Andacht is also at times translated as devotion (as on 687 in the first sentence of III.2.b) and
Kultus is translated as worship (as in the sentence on 687 just noted). See Hegel, Vorlesungen

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ber die sthetik II, werke 14 (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1970), 334. To clear up this
confusion, I am amending the translation so that Andacht is always devotion and Kultus is
translated as cultus. This has the added benefit of bringing the translation more in line with
Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion (hereinafter LPR), trans. Brown, Hodgson, and
Stewart (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, v.I 1984, v.III 1985).
37
ALFA, 696, translation amended.
38
Ibid., 687, translation amended.
39
Ibid., 696.
40
The ALFA lectures date from 1823 to 1829 (see ALFA I, vi.), while the lectures from which the
Philosophy of Religion is taken date from 1821 to 1831 (See LPR I, xiii).
41
The translation of ALFA obscures this; see n. 40 above. See also LPR I, 445.
42
Hegel, LPR I, 306.
43
Hegel, LPR III, for the phrase Being of the Community see 149, on the sacraments see 153.
44
Ibid., 152.
45
Ibid., 153.
46
LPR III, all quotes regarding absolute singularity are taken from 186 to 187.
47
ALFA, 692.
48
Ibid., 698.
49
For a prominent example see Axel Honneth, The Struggle For Recognition: The Moral Grammar of
Social Conflicts, trans. Joel Anderson (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996).
50
Alice Y. Kimm, Morphosis Diamond in the Rough, Architecture Week, from http://www.
architectureweek.com/2000/0621/design_2-1.html.
51
The general discussion of Diamond Ranch draws on Jeffrey Kipnis and Todd Gannon, Morphosis:
Diamond Ranch High School (New York: The Monacelli Press, 2001).
52
Herbert Muschamp, The Library That Puts on Fishnets and Hits the Disco, New York Times, May
16, 2004.
53
Brian Kenney, After Seattle, Library Journal, Aug. 15, 2005.
54
Witold Rybczynski, Seattles Best (and Worst): What Happens When Architecture Pays Attention to
Its Surroundings (and when It Doesnt), Slate, May 16, 2007, from http://www.slate.com/id/
2166300/.
55
Jen Graves, My Five Favorite American Buildings, The Stranger, Feb. 15, 2007, from http://
slog.thestranger.com/2007/02/five_favorite_buildings.
56
Benjamin Fried, Mixing with the Kool Crowd: Have Architecture Critics Forgotten How to Judge
Public Spaces? Making Places Newsletter, Jul. 2004, from http://www.pps.org/info/newsletter/
july2004/july_2004_feature.
57
Quotes are taken from John N. Berry III, Where Democracy HappensThomson Gale/Library
Journal Library of the Year: Salt Lake City Public Library, Library Journal, Jun. 15, 2006.