This document summarizes a community participation project in Satkhira, Bangladesh led by Risal Ahmed. The project aimed to build disaster-resilient housing for communities affected by Cyclone Aila in 2009. Key steps included initial contact with communities, studying existing housing and landscapes, design workshops to develop housing options, building a demonstration house using local materials, and constructing all new houses and a school with community involvement. The project emphasized trust-building, capacity development, and incorporating local knowledge to ensure community ownership over the process and sustainable outcomes.

1. Community participation: looking
through an “outsider’s” eyes
Risal Ahmed,
Department of Architecture, BRAC University
January 25, 2011

2. Community participation: looking
through an “outsider’s” eyes
Structure of the presentation
• Who am I ?
• What is community participation?
• Case: Disaster Resilient Habitat in Satkhira (Partners: people
of Adarshagram, Padmapukur, Shaymnagar, Shatkhira. UNDP, BRAC
and the Department of Architecture, BRAC University)
Risal Ahmed
Department of Architecture, BRAC University
January 25, 2011

3. Who am I ? What are my identities?
Architect
Friend
Carpenter
Mason
Accountant
Student
Outsider
Brother
Model Maker Labor
Trying to become an architect

4. What is Community Participation?
I’ll try to address this as we go on……

5. Product
vs.
Process

6. Product vs. Process
Product happens.
If we take care of the process with love and
compassion good product happens.

7. Process happens from understanding context.
Community participation is indispensable for the
process.

8. Let’s take the case of Satkhira, to explain this,
where I’m currently working.

9. Cyclone Aila hit the Bangladesh
on Monday 25 May 2009
_substantial damage across
areas of southern Bangladesh
and West Bengal.
_massive flooding
_contaminated drinking water
sources with seawater
_killed the fish that people rear
in the freshwater ponds satkhira
_most houses, latrines have
been washed away
_the threat of water-borne
diseases

10. The location of site
satkhira

11. The location of site
Adarsha Gram
Kopothakho River
Kholpetua River

12. The Steps
Initial contact
Study
Design workshop 1: dream houses
Design workshop 2: options of real houses
Demonstration house
Construction of all houses and school with landscaping
Transition

13. Initial contact
Community people with the representatives from UNDP and from the
Department of Architecture, BRAC University, 2009.

14. The settlement

15. Study
Strengths and Weaknesses
of houses

16. Local houses, building materials and landscape
Local House Materials Local plants
•CGI Sheet •Golpatta (Nyper
Fruiticans)
•Asbestos
•Garan
•Golpatta (Nyper
Fruiticans) •Keora
•Garan Tree Branches •Gewa
•Bamboo •Bain
•Wood
•Mud

17. The landscape
Without the rhythm of rivers and tide

18. The landscape
With the rhythm of rivers and tide

19. Change of landscape

20. Livelihood of people

21. Strengths
Of People
•Survival Skills
•Hard Working
•Fishing Skills
•Boating Skills
•Boat Making Skills
•Expert Mud Walkers
Of Place
•Easy Water
Transportation
•Availability of Wood
and Golpatta

22. Weaknesses
Of People
•Critical Minded
•Complex (Back Talking)
•No Sharing
•Relief Minded
Of Place
•Salt Water
•Soil Quality
•Lack of Sweet Water
•Cyclone Prone Area
•Transportation

23. Design workshop 1: dream houses

24. Construction Season
vs.
“Funding Season”

25. Design workshop 2: options of real houses
At the Department of Architecture, BRAC University
Participants:
Masons,
carpenters, poet,
singer,
mud-workers,
house-owners,
engineers,
architects,
disaster
managers,
students of
architecture.

26. Our objective is to build “trust” before building houses.

27. trust = speed cost
trust = speed cost
“our distrust is very expensive”.
“technique and technology are
important, but adding trust is the issue
of the decade.”
(Stephen M R Covey, The speed of Trust)

28. Lets build a demonstration house
“The outsiders”: animator, architects, engineers, disaster manager

29. Build “outsiders
own house” first!

30. Building materials for demonstration house

31. “Sustainability”
Sustainability in terms of global environmental point
of view might be questionable but sustainability in
terms of local needs and aspirations must not be
ignored.
(K Hasibul Kabir and Fuad H Mallick, 2006, Spaces in the homesteads of the ultra-poor)

32. Demonstration house
Try to reduce the use
of concrete which
has high embodied Concrete
energy. Wood
Clay tiles for roofing
Flexibility / future expansion

33. Making of
study-model

34. Material purchase and transportation with/by house owners
and local builders

35. Learning
The tide and the mud
The engineers

36. Hands-on construction
Sharing of Knowledge
Technical + Traditional
Working Together

37. Hands-on construction

38. Design and drawings on site

39. Innovation / improvement on local building techniques
Concrete
Appropriate cement, aggregate, water ratio
Use of sweet water
Appropriate specification of reinforcement
Appropriate curing

40. Use of local wood
Diagonal and horizontal Cross-bracings
Metal clamps under posts
Metal straps with roof frames
GI wire tie with roof and concrete beams

41. Improvements of clay-roofing-tiles

42. Improvements of clay-roofing-tiles

43. freedom to design own spaces
heightens aesthetic sensitivity.
expectations are not limited to basic needs but are
also extended to sensitivity about light, smell,
sound, view, breeze and openness.
(Fuad H Mallick and K Hasibul Kabir, 2007, Spaces in the homesteads of the ultra-poor)

44. “let’s participate”!!

45. Construction Committee
‘Matbors’
Tuesday and
Friday meeting
Conflict management
Notice/information boards

46. Make Intelligent
Compromise
Preconceived Idea
+
Irrational Judgment
‘Listen to ideas and
opinions but we should
be rational and not
conclusive’

47. 55 to 43

48. Transition and Critical Group
Build capacity
to build by
themselves.
concept
diagram of a
habitat in
Satkhira

49. when a king dies, his people say:
“he did this; he did that….”
but when a great king dies, they say:
“we did everything ourselves.”
-old Chinese saying

50. THANK YOU