“Ibasho” is a Japanese word combining “i”(being) and “basho”(place) and was originally used to describe a physical location. Since the 1980s, non-institutional places with keywords such as “ibasho,” including “takurosho,” “community cafes,” and “kodomo shokudo” opened simultaneously around Japan. Afterward, some of these non-institutional places were institutionalized, used as models for institutions or incorporated into institutions. However, a question arises as to how ibasho, that is, non-institutional places, can be institutionalized. Therefore, this paper discusses the institutionalization process of non-institutional places and case studies in architectural planning research involved in this process.
Referring to previous studies, the fundamental difference between non-institutional places and institutions is taken as follows. Namely, the function of ibasho will be prepared in response to people's demands. Contrary, functions of institutions are predetermined in advance of people's demands. “demand-function” relationship is inverted between ibasho and institutions. Therefore, it is possible to consider the institutionalization of non-institutional places from the perspective of the inversion of “demand-function” relationship.
Materials analyzed in this paper are 31 papers published in the “Journal of Architecture, Planning and Environmental Engineering” with “ibasho” in the title between 1997 and 2019. I consider the methodologies of these papers.
Ibasho initially meant a non-institutional place, but many of these papers considered ibasho to be associated with institutions. By focusing on the critical subjects and the research aims of these 31 papers, this paper found the following disputable issues such as (a)inversion of “demand-function” relationship, namely, regarding the places studied as means to fill the scarcities, and (b)generalizing research findings from the case studies.
Twenty of the 31 papers focused on various scarcities, and target places were selected to solve the scarcities of which were supposed by researchers. In some of these papers, researchers try to grasp people's needs or suggest needs to people before starting the research to fill in the scarcities. This is the preemption of people's demands by others, thus leading to the inversion of “demand-function” relationship, where functions should be prepared by responding to people's demands.
Nineteen of the 31 papers aim to generalize research findings, but none of them explain why research findings from a limited number of case studies can be generalized, and this makes a leap in logic. One strategy employed to overcome this leap is to situate the places studied in certain existing frames. The frames referred to here are the building types of institutions, but ibasho can not have such frames, because of being a non-institutional place. In some of these studies, researchers define ibasho as their study objects from the viewpoint of functions and situate them in certain existing frames, thus treating them like institutions. Another strategy employed to overcome this leap is to reduce the phenomena found in their research objects to some physical and/or psychological elements and interpret them. In papers that aim to generalize research findings, it is implicitly assumed that the research findings can be applied to institutions or places that have not yet existed. The fact that institutions or places have not yet existed means that people who supposedly demand something can not be, is also leading to the inversion of “demand-function” relationship.
Through these methodologies, architectural planning research leads to the inversion of “demand-function” relationship. The accumulation of knowledge that inverts “demand-function” relationship will be useful for institutionalizing ibasho.
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