Minimalist urbanism: Search for conceptualization and method

Minimalism represents both a philosophy that values people and nature, not matter and a simplification that is achieved intentionally or voluntarily in order to highlight the elements that are valued in human life. This philosophy has been adopted across a broad geographical area since ancient times under various terms. Today, concepts within the minimalist lifestyle, such as low consumption, local production, diversification in mode of production, ecological sustainability, and sharing economy continue to gain popularity especially in Global North countries. These concepts are also among the fundamental principles embraced in economic and political approaches such as Buddhist economics, Marxist political economy and degrowth discourses. When the social, political and economic processes created by capitalism that has revived in different forms in the past few hundred years, and the reflections of human greed, which should be controlled rationally, for the city are considered, it is obvious that there is a structural problem, which encourages the greedy nature of human beings. Therefore, a structural solution to this issue can be the formulation of a minimalist approach in the wills and efforts that form the urban built environment. In the study, firstly, the minimalist parameters that shape the approach to the production of urban built environment were determined. The parameters were determined based on the political, economic, social and cultural dimensions of the planning system. In this context, three basic parameters were determined: presence of policies that allow public acquisition of land value increases created by spatial plans and building construction so as to control the undeserved rent gain; the place of the construction sector in the economy, which is effective in making land an investment tool; and material ownership in the context of material elements on which the minimalist approach is based. In the measurement of the parameters, the focus was first on the value research in which the social structure was examined in line with Inglehart's (post)materialism theory and the concept of quality of life, which was discussed in terms of the improvement of human life, which is the main subject on which minimalist philosophy is based. In this context, a total of 15 countries including Sweden, Finland, Germany, England, Austria, Spain, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey, Argentina, Colombia, India and Qatar were selected as the research sample. In the study, which carried out a comparative analysis and evaluation based on qualitative and quantitative data at the country level, statistical data of international official institutions (planning legislation of countries, World Bank, OECD, Eurostat, IMF, UN Stats, etc.) and data obtained from written sources were used as the major sources of data and information. As a result, it has been seen that there is a potential for the adoption of the minimalist urbanism approach in countries where policies are in place to prevent land from becoming an investment tool and to enable the transfer of value increases resulting from planning to public authorities, where construction sector is not a determining factor in economic policies, and where housing is prevented from becoming an investment tool. This context demonstrates that the adoption of the minimalist urbanism approach in a society is possible through changes in societal values that determine the formation of the built environment, land value capture policies, the role of the construction sector in the economy, and material ownership elements.