TROPICAL FRENCH THEORY: Henri Lefebvre and the Reinvention of Urban Planning in Havana, Cuba (1968–1971)

Abstract

Contributing to global urban history, planning theory and the geography of ideas, this article discusses the travels of Henri Lefebvre’s The Right to the City in the wake of May 1968, in France. That year, under the direction of Mario González and Max Baquero, a small team including the Italian architect Vittorio Garatti, French planner Jean-Pierre Garnier and Spanish architect Eusebio Azcue, at the Instituto de Planificación Física in Havana, proposed to introduce an entirely novel approach to the design of the capital that was directly inspired by Lefebvre’s book. Though these Lefebvrian references ultimately disappeared, many of the book’s principles continued to resonate in the Plan ultimately promulgated. Told through the voice of one of the last living members of the group, Jean-Pierre Garnier, alongside archival documents and published interviews, the article explains how The Right to the City imprinted itself on the lives of this group of planners in Havana, and the overlooked significance of the Plan’s legacy for global histories and theories of urban space.