(re)Displaced in City: Human Rights-Based Architecture to Overcome Newcomers' Marginalization and Degrading Treatment in Paris

(re)Displaced in City explores the link between architecture and human rights concerning newcomers’ (refugees, asylum seekers and irregular migrants) marginalization and degrading treatment in Paris. A specific focus is drawn on newcomers who have limited or no resources and are “trapped” in the complex bureaucratic system that limits access to fundamental rights, expulse from society and leaves no alternatives but to live in degrading conditions. The research brings an argument that universal rights do not align with state territorial politics and that architecture attributed to helping newcomers is a product of the current politics that keeps feeding the faulty system rather than tackling the problem. Opposite of this, rights-based architecture to overcome newcomers’ marginalization and degrading treatment not just provides a shelter but architecture that empowers social changes of acceptance and a co-living mindset. The research leads to the architectural intervention in the square de la Chapelle alongside the boulevard de la Chapelle in the north of Paris. One of the most reclaimed spaces by newcomers since 2015 where inhuman living conditions, repeatable re-displacement social expulsion and violence against newcomers are evident in the urban fabrics. The proposed design aims to show how architecture based on a social-mixed-shared program could be used to strengthen the social bond and a sense of collectivity to overcome newcomers’ marginalization and degrading treatment urgency. This research-based project is structured in three main parts: (re)Displaced – the research, (re)Position – the link between research and architectural design, and (re)Shape – the architectural intervention.Architecture, Urbanism and Building Science