Build, baby, build
Putting up concrete structures everywhere is one of the most destructive human traits
It’s so Trump. In the middle of the world’s most intractable conflict, he sniffed out real estate possibilities in Gaza. After all, the ceasefire deal was partly brokered by his property developer buddy. Remember that Trump’s damad Kushner had talked up the possibilities of Gaza’s waterfront. But why single out the Trump family. This real estate view of the world is widely shared by many policymakers and some super-rich. Fragile beaches or mountains or islands or even planets like Mars, there’s no piece of land they can’t make over into a property listing. That’s why, for example, the Great Nicobar islands are being prospected for ‘mega-development’. Even the high Himalayas are newly disaster-prone, because of rampant overbuilding sharpening the risk of avalanches and floods.
What does a developer care about the resilience of the environment or the long-term chances of living there? They simply raze and build, social and environmental costs don’t figure. Their responsibility ends at the point of sale. The risks are all yours, dear buyer, whether they stem from bitter, dispossessed locals or ecological vulnerabilities. Malibu or Nicobar, they’ll sell you the pretty brochures and leave you to figure out the fine print.
There has been some belated acknowledgment of the real estate sector’s obligation to decarbonise, the need for a circular economy, retrofitting old buildings for new uses, rather than demolishing and starting from scratch. But the bad old ways die hard: as long as the planet is seen as property to be sold for a quick buck, rather than a commonwealth, an ark, a home to be cherished because our lives depend on it, we’ll keep paving our paradises and putting up parking lots there. Condos in Gaza? Don’t rule it out. Palestinians? They can be moved to Negev desert, Kushner had said.
This piece appeared as an editorial opinion in the print edition of The Times of India.
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