INTERSTICES 20 57 POLITICAL MATTERS CHRISTINA DELUCHI The politics of social architecture in Medellín: A reading of the Parque Biblioteca España Introduction Colombia’s contemporary urban identity is often described as a tale of its two largest cities: Bogota and Medellín (Castro & Echeverri, 2011; Webb, 2011). Spanning over two decades (1996-2020), this tale outlines the country’s two distinct approaches to urban renewal. Discussed in parallel, both approaches are centred around progressive leadership and large-scale social projects that respond to issues of governance and spatial violence. 1 In Bogota, the capital, incentive-based social experiments restructured everyday civic and cultural be- haviours and generated a mutual respect among citizens, thus altering the local experience of the public realm (1995-2000). 2 In Medellín, changes to educational and cultural programmes embedded in new architectural projects transformed the urban image of precarious areas in the city (2004-2012). Differentiation be- tween these two urban approaches lies in architecture, particularly in Medellín, where buildings have rapidly changed perceptions of the city’s urban reality. From 2004, architecture has been used as a strategic visual and material tool in the implementation of Medellín’s dramatic urban renaissance. This architectur- al narrative, which has spread through global media, attributes the change to a collaboration between politicians and architects, who were dedicated to rehabil- itating the urban environment through social projects. The collaboration arose from public criticisms regarding the local government’s failed efforts to curb urban violence and oversee social investment. In response, both of Medellín’s first independent mayors, Sergio Fajardo, a mathematics professor (2004-08), and Alonso Salazar, a journalist (2008-12), worked with architects on violence prevention and political participation strategies to establish equity in city-wide distributions of public space, local development networks, and public goods and services. At the same time, Medellín saw a decline in spatial violence after para- military and narcotics groups were demobilised in 2006. Thus, Medellín became an urban paradigm for progressive upgrading strategies. A “globally recognised effort”, the Medellín model integrates marginalised areas in its city-wide strate- gy to increase liveability standards for its citizens (Abello Colack & Pearce, 2015: 199). The model emphasises architecture’s ability to incite social change and fo- cuses on a selection of key political actors and architectural works to significantly