Assessing ‘Quality’: The unfolding of the ‘Good’—Collective decision making in juries of urban design competitions

SummaryThe radical orientation towards the future; the notion of novelty, experimentation and creativity makes an architectural competition a fascinating object – not least for management studies. In the paper at hand we discuss findings of an ethnographic study on the jury assessment sessions of four recent architectural competitions in Switzerland. We consider these meetings as a laboratory from which we might gain a better understanding of collective decision making processes in general, that is, beyond the scope of design competitions.We point out that the relevant criteria for assessment of architectural propositions are not given in advance; rather they emerge during, that is, through the jury's decision making process: while the board of jurors explores the space of potential solutions as generated by the submitted architectural propositions. Therefore, we believe that a competition jury's decision making (or sense making) process tells us a lot about dealing with complex situations. Situations that do not just display a variety of actors (humans and non-humans) but in particular a high degree of intertwining of the involved actors.

Research highlights▶ High degree of complexity within jury sessions of architectural competitions. ▶ Decisive criteria to assess projects evolve within act of assessing itself. ▶ Critical program givens can be seen as singularities. ▶ Modulating singularities is a fundamental principle of judging architectural projects.