The ethical landscape : What if sustainability is just colonialism wearing green ?

What if sustainability is just colonialism wearing green ?

In Episode 08 of Cities of Tomorrow, Dr Hamed Tavakoli joins Dr Alban Mannisi for a thought-provoking conversation about ethical landscape design, sustainable urban planning, and the political forces shaping our cities. When ideas developed in one cultural context are presented as universal solutions, can sustainable development reproduce the inequalities it promises to address ?

Drawing on his international experience in landscape architecture, teaching, and research, Alban explores how local cultures, histories, and relationships with the environment challenge conventional approaches to urban design. Together, Hamed and Alban discuss what it means to design with communities, respect Indigenous knowledge, and question assumptions about progress, development, and environmental responsibility.

Topics include :

• Sustainability and colonialism : How externally imposed models of sustainable cities can overlook local priorities, cultural values, and existing environmental practices.
• The political philosophy of landscape : Why landscape architecture involves more than physical spaces, encompassing memory, identity, power, and the ways people live together.
• Cultural diversity in urban design : How experiences across Europe and Asia challenge the idea that one planning model can work everywhere.
• Ethical landscape design : The importance of listening, understanding local contexts, and recognising communities’ existing expertise before proposing solutions.
• Community participation : Why consultation must offer people a meaningful opportunity to influence—and fundamentally change—a project.
• Indigenous knowledge and coastal resilience : What designers can learn from custodianship, relationships between land and water, and established approaches to environmental management.
• Green capitalism and regenerative design : Whether greener projects transform underlying systems, and why regeneration requires understanding how places became degraded.
• Artificial intelligence in architecture and design : The ethical risks of AI-generated imagery that misrepresents real places, communities, and environmental conditions.
• Advice for emerging landscape architects : Practising humility, embracing cultural differences, and adapting design as communities and ecosystems change.

For listeners interested in sustainable cities, landscape architecture, environmental justice, community-led planning, and the future of urban design, this episode asks a central question : whose vision of sustainability are we building—and who gets to decide ?