Projektsamtalets intersubjektivitet. Språkbruk och handlingsmöjligheter i byggprojekt

Sammanfattning: Against a background of projects carried out, the aim of this thesis is to investigate what it is that regulates the project dialogue and how this can be described when applied to facts and value assessments in the management of construction projects and the end-users’ physical and perceived environments. This problem has partly involved testing a structure for describing concrete situations and partly investigating certain theoretical prerequisites that can be assumed to exist in such a description. The project dialogue is identified with a point of departure from the rational dialogue and with the concept of inter-subjectivity the project dialogue is related to a language determined theory of knowledge. Planning, construction and managerial activities have come to be expressed in a construction-related professional language jargon as a means of communication and with a perspective that has a dominating role in the project dialogue. This is a form of hybrid dialogue with a jargon for program studies and detail-design with a large exchange of different professional knowledge, experience and interests. The prerequisites for the users are regulated in the briefing activity that the developer, the representatives for the users of the premises and the staff are capable of constituting and organizing. The regulation of the project dialogue has been assumed to stem from relationships between fundamental concepts, which are both necessary for the description of concrete situations and that imply the expressions to the regulation of the rational dialogue. It is mutual relationships between fundamental concepts and expressions that make it possible to carry out descriptions in everyday language that have a general validity. If there were not any possibilities for objective descriptions in everyday language, according to knowledge theory it would at the same time be meaningless to claim that science and other professional languages utilize worlds and concepts more precise than as is the case with everyday language.This challenges the notion that to develop the regulation of project dialogues to ones own specialized activity language as project dialogues often encompass different activity languages and professional jargon, which is undergoing continual and in certain cases extreme development. Therefore it is suggested here that an understandable regulation of project dialogues should find its expression in everyday language in fundamental concepts as a general language fellowship. The thesis is in Swedish with an English language summary: On the basis of projects carried out, the aim of this thesis is to investigate what it is that regulates project dialogues and how the terms for planning, construction and management processes can be described with regard to factual and evaluative assessments in dealing with end users’ physical and perceived workplace environments. The thesis investigates the problem of describing the regulation of the project dialogue in relation to a number of problem-oriented projects, the rational dialogue as well as the inter-subjectivity of language. These problem-oriented projects are investigated both as a rational objective means and as a reflective dialogue in order to gain a better understanding of aims and courses of action. The project dialogue is identified with a point of departure from the rational dialogue and with the concept of inter-subjectivity the project dialogue is related to a linguistically determined theory of knowledge. The research issues assume that the regulation of the project dialogue is not merely tested and conventionally determined but can also be described rationally. The first chapter (1) encompasses an introduction to the project concept and an orientation about experience and professional knowledge where theoretical and practical skills emerge in various forms of knowledge with language as the common means in addition to other media-related tools. An account is given of fields of research that are linked to this thesis’s investigations within architectural research, that professional participants with language as an activity and a tool unite and utilize professional knowledge in project dialogues with the aim of compiling descriptions and sketches for proposals within the scope of a commission. The language of an activity and professional language are displayed as a means of communication, which is characterized by being related to a specialized task and that these constitute a necessary working instrument. In activities with institutional languages the participants act according to the traditions of the specific activity. Planning activity has to a high degree been dominated by instrumental actions at the same time design has increasingly been developed professionally for the management of complex problems. Uncertainty and lack of precision between different fields of activity is discussed in collaboration with how one shall better be able to understand a shared field of competence. The communicative way of working is aroused in order to also be able to deal with controversial situations where knowledge, experience and ideologies strongly diverge. Dealing with so-called wicked problems provides a point of entry to a broadened field of knowledge where boundaries that enforce routine rules can be reviewed. Chapters two and four (2,4) provide an account of the prerequisites for describing project dialogues, which in this thesis are confined to investigating how problems and product determination can be regulated. The problem-oriented projects have been utilized partly for describing how the project dialogue has been regulated in concrete contexts and partly as reflections about certain theoretical prerequisites that can be assumed to exist in such a description. The expression regulation of the rational dialogue has been used partly in order to test and describe aspects of the regulation of concrete situations in the problem-oriented projects and partly in order to place the expressions in relationship to certain theory of knowledge prerequisites. With emphasis on the inter-subjective relations of the participants in the dialogues in the problem-oriented projects have stood out as activities with knowledge of action. The inter-subjective is the common denominator for language, conditions of existence and situations that persons can fall into. Everyday language constitutes a working fellowship, inter-subjectivity, in the processing of professional and activity-related knowledge for participants with different language jargon associated with their work. People working professionally are skilled at both utilizing routine procedures and at reflecting over professionally related applications regarding problem and product determination. The project dialogue encompasses statement knowledge about the relationships between to plan, construct and utilize. At the same time the project dialogue encompasses the knowledge of having a feeling for factual and evaluative assessments in the collaboration of formulating, scrutinizing and bringing about a proposal for a built object. The prerequisites for the project dialogue are presented with a knowledge theoretical point of departure from the inter-subjectivity of language, partly that language is a person’s spoken actions in a concrete situation and partly that language is a system of rules. Concrete language actions and regulatory structures presuppose each other and the relationship between these is explained by language actions being logically seen as primary because the regulatory system can only be expressed with the aid of language actions. Proponents for the theory of knowledge with conditions for description primarily investigate the regulatory structure’s relationships regarding mutually fundamental concepts, for instance, things and scope for action, which apply to both everyday language and scientific language. The relationship between fundamental concepts is determined by the character of reality and our knowledge situation. By utilizing these basic concepts it is not a question of purely formal logic but a language structure of meaning and informal logical characteristics. With regard to concrete situations the circumstances of language actions embrace the theme that provides content to communication. These situations are determined in the context of physical factors, social circumstances, psychological conditions and the means of participating in a communication. For investigations of how a rational project dialogue can be described in concrete situations, this thesis starts off from the concept of the rational dialogue, which is regulated with regard to those allowed to participate, arena, subject and purpose and means that the subject is conducted. Chapter three (3) begins with an account of the construction-related language jargon that includes cross-professional dialogues between representatives from various specialist fields. The language jargon of the construction industry has a dominant role in project dialogues, not seldom at the cost of formulated demands and needs that representatives from the end-users of the activity have requested. Regarding project dialogues concerning physical planning, and with the universal reason that those affected by a change should have their say in the matter, as long as there is time for influence the problem-oriented projects are displayed with criteria for consultation. The concept of consultation provides a means of examining implemented projects and at the same time includes the aim of making recommendations for influencing physical planning. The problem-oriented projects carried out have presented situation dependent knowledge and underlined the importance of proximity to a wealth of details in order to develop a nuanced notion of reality. The importance of the work of the architect within work-environmental research, with buildings, activities and working conditions as prerequisites, has regarding product determination contributed to the articulation of contexts of physical, social and psychological circumstances. An important contribution that architectural research within the field of work environment has developed concerns how combined planning problems can be managed and processed. The problem-oriented project “Work environment determination and the health and safety inspectorate” has investigated four cases of dealing with work-environmental issues in construction projects. The health and safety inspectorate’s scrutiny and statements concerning building and planning permission applications, as well as the participation of the safety protection officer concerned, is regulated by both work-environmental legislation and building and planning legislation with the associated councils and regulations. This study was focused on the hindrances that the safety protection officers and the health and safety inspectors primarily encountered at the legislative preliminary assessment during the later stages of the product determination – at the time when changes in the design of the work environment were in practice very limited. The problem-oriented project “The safety protection officer appeals” has encompassed thirty-one cases that were investigated with regard to the opportunities for the safety protection officers and the employee organizations (unions) to make appeals against building and planning permission once granted. These appeal cases highlighted work-related environmental shortcomings in the studied applications for building and planning permission and that the employees’ representatives had not always participated in the product determination. With both of these problem-oriented projects the project and work-environmental concept was reviewed in a legislative context. At the same time it was a linguistic management and an exchange of information, appeal documents and decisions within the various construction projects. These cases describe how the employees’ representatives merely in a limited manner, with instructions and legislative texts, attempted to influence the determination of the product with formal statements about what needed to be changed. When compared with experiences from project assignments, work-related environmental and detail design courses within architectural education, ongoing work-environment research as well as various demands regarding information management in construction projects there was a marked difference. The participation of the end user in the cases studied was expressed as a limited influence according to a juridical interpretation of work-environment regulations and not as a broad and in-depth user influence according to developed and recognized principles for collaboration. With the investigation of the appeal processes it was further confirmed that it was in the early stages that work-related environmental proposals should be developed for the planning of a good environment. The problem-oriented project “Methods for consultation and collaboration” has investigated the opportunities for the future users via internal consultation and collaboration with the detail designers contribute with their experience and thereby influence the design of the refurbishment and extension to the office of Statistics Sweden in Örebro. This planning of the workplace environment was largely a communication between the various members of the project within a project organization with a well-tried way of dealing with things and routines for project meetings. The representatives of the employees participated in the building project’s decision-making group and working groups during the various stages of the planning process having an insight into all planning issues. The users were able monitor and influence work-environment issues in a more influential manner that what a formal scrutiny encompasses. With this problem-oriented project methods were introduced for the users to formulate briefs for the workplace environment in construction projects with support from experience from research and tuition within architecture and detail-design planning methods. Experience from this problem-oriented project demonstrated the employees’ possibilities, given model examples, of with simple methods and limited support being able to describe and formulate qualified proposals for their workplace environment. The problem-oriented project “Work environment determination and detail-design methods” has been carried out with a compilation of workplace-related environmental research within architecture and the recognized need for workplace descriptions as a tool for product determination and learning processes during changes of activity. At five different places of work, with different relationships of meeting places for planning, collaborative project participants in everyday work in order to describe the importance of the activities and the premises with regard to workplace environment. Planning routines and help to self-help were introduced so that employees and persons in managerial positions would be able to sort out their own proposals for themselves. The findings from the case studies underlined the need for knowledge about the prerequisites and the conditions for the project with the workplace as the object as well as skills in project work between professional groups. The limited amount of project support manifested itself as supervision for project discussions where the participants, employees, specialists, such as persons responsible for the workplace environment and responsible for the activity concerned, contributed with both specialist and everyday knowledge. The problem-oriented project “To move – room for new thoughts” has been carried out with the aim of making use of the knowledge and experience of the nursing staff about working conditions at the Orthopedic Clinic at the Örebro Regional Hospital in order to design clinic premises and build up the nursing staff’s knowledge of methods for the meeting with hospital planners and design consultants. Methods for systematic descriptions of nursing care chains within the activity were developed with the possibilities for the various professional groups to complement these with demands and problem descriptions in order to preclude physically and psychologically burdening nursing tasks. These descriptions about the chain of events in nursing work were used as references in the project dialogue in order to formulate a planning brief for the premises and function studies, the dimensioning of ward space and for scrutiny of the planning proposal. At the same time a basic educational project was carried out at the School of Architecture, which with its point of departure from among other things the problem-oriented project’s material formulated proposals for the design of the clinic premises. For a mutual exchange of knowledge the qualities and problems of the proposals were discussed between the nursing staff and the participating students in the basic educational project. The problem-oriented project “A new agenda for the detail design process” has been carried out as an application of the construction industry’s environmental manual for refurbishment projects for both a school and a health-care building. In these projects it was primarily the buildings that were the objects for environmental analyses. The usage of the manual was aimed at being a tool and a support for the client, the design team and the contractor with regard to the management and verification of environmental demands. The construction projects were used as a means of testing the environmental manual in concrete cases. The manual was applied as a reference for both decisions and implementations concerning environmental measures in the planning, construction and property management processes. The differences in the relationship to the other problem-oriented projects, with their activity associated and organizational work-oriented environmental demands, was that the environmental demands were solely selected with a point of departure from a manual with general and in several cases detailed demands for the technical design of the building. The application of the environmental manual was used to test and propose routines for the exchange of knowledge, primarily between the client and the designer, during the different stages of the construction project, but also to investigate the need for project and construction meetings with an adjusted agenda to take in environmental issues. Against a background of familiarity and the active access to their own established activities, the communicative context and involvement on the part of the user has revealed itself in its ability to describe problems and proposals. For the participants this has contributed to conceptualizing the project dialogue and become familiar with this as an activity and tool. The introduction to chapter five (5) provides an account of the assumptions about the identity of the project dialogue. The prerequisites for describing the regulation of the project dialogue have been assumed to be grounded on the relationships between fundamental concepts that imply the expressions of the rational dialogue regulation. A first attempt at gaining an overall view indicated that the participants in the project dialogue could unequivocally be understood as subjects, language users and persons. The arena can be understood as the place in time and space for the project participants’ encounters. The concept ‘intention’, which belongs to the inter-dependent concepts, implies purpose and reason, which for the regulation of the project dialogue means testing if the reasons the participants propose are valid. The project and problem determination, as the subject and the object for the project dialogue, always presuppose the concepts of thing, experience and scope for action. From these perspectives the regulation of the project dialogue are setout in chapter five. The way in which the subject may be conducted presupposes a minimum of mutual understanding, that is to say inter-subjectivity, the practical course of action of which means that ‘the dialogue can be carried out in many different ways but not in any old way’, and that for each respective problem-oriented project is set out in chapter three. The continuation of chapter five, the project dialogue’s concrete situations, begins with an account of “the subject of the project dialogue” identified as problem and product determination, that is to say the design process. This section provides an account of the relationship between learning project and construction project with regard to product determination. The project dialogue, product determination and professional knowledge are mutually dependent on each other. In the criticism of sequential models for product determination attention is drawn to the differences between construction project and learning project. In the construction project the project dialogue is primarily expected to be used as an activity and professional knowledge as the means. For dealing with certain intricate issues in learning situations the project dialogue manifests itself as a tool and the use of professional knowledge as an activity with experience as a consequence. The mutual dependency between learning and the production of products is articulated in the problem-oriented projects carried out for the special purpose of fostering the participation of the user in the product determination for a better built environment. The section “Arenas for the project dialogue” includes encounter situations for regulating the dialogue and clarifying the participants’ viewpoints and intentions. An arena is a communicative place where the participants discuss and develop project courses. The encounter of meeting is regarded as a work forum where the participants collaborate, negotiate and regulate the design of the built object. Arenas for the project dialogue in the investigations of the problem-oriented projects have especially emphasized time and space for the collaboration meeting, the user meeting and the detail-design meeting. The collaboration meeting is explained as a prerequisite for the users’ activity-related project dialogues. The users’ meeting is explained as a prerequisite for the end-users’ activity-related project dialogues and the detail-design meeting is explained as an asset for the users’ construction-related project dialogues. “The purpose of the project dialogue” is to achieve a rational argumentation for the formulation of the problem and product determination. The participants shall investigate if the reasons that are put forward are relevant and assess this reasoning with each other. Clarification of the project dialogue with rules that standardize its aim, include the processing and identification of problems and requirements for the task of formulating proposals. For the aim of the project dialogue attention is drawn to routine regulations and rules for sharpening the attention to the purpose of the dialogue. Routines for a construction-related project dialogue are utilized in the problem and construction project for testing the construction sector’s environmental manual. With this manual the participants had access to a professional jargon with terms covering a specialized problem field. This meant testing routines for formulating documentation and collaboration at meetings in order to regulate environmental proposals. The detail-design architects’ and the client’s experience of projects found its expression as competence and intimate knowledge in the use of recognized methods and ways of working with regard to product determination. Concerning the application of the environmental manual client and consultants’ knowledge was made available. The participants’ project knowledge was a prerequisite for the opportunity of testing the environmental manual. The refurbishment project could therefore be used as a means of testing the manual’s possibilities for being used as a tool for the developer during the planning, construction and management processes. The procedure for sharpening attention meant applying professional knowledge in learning processes. The problem-oriented projects meant that users got time together for describing and collaborating in project groups. The workplaces have been investigated by user groups supported by a supervisor. The tasks of describing existing conditions, formulating proposals, identifying problems and processing demands have constituted a methodical theme during the development of the project dialogue. This has been about encouraging the participants to orientate themselves and link together the various professional and activity-related types of knowledge to descriptions and proposals. The important introductory activity was the participants’ involvement and reflections in the project dialogue. Apart from starting off the project, the project group formulated descriptions of that which the participants in the clinic activity referred to, and for this reason the collaboration successively changed in part as the group took disposition of an increasingly detailed and complemented problem and proposal area. The discussions in the group provided a foundation for making safer assessments of different needs and problems, something that the participants could localize to those descriptions that were common for the project group. One knew in which specific context that their work colleagues’ assessments of nursing work manifested themselves. The knowledge that the users had at their disposal did not in itself lead to the project task. The project knowledge when working for the introductory aim had its foothold in the discussions and provided direction and orientation for the project dialogue in exchange for the participants’ varied professional and activity-related knowledge. The supervised tasks in the clinic project included the sorting out of the prerequisites for the project, supporting the project dialogue with regard to descriptions and collaboration, contributing with knowledge of workplace environments and projects and feeing back project experience into the project group. The participants’ professional knowledge was largely unspoken with implied actions, a factor that the work colleagues trusted. However, for the project dialogue it was necessary to be able to describe how one could achieve mutual intentions together, to give advice and state reasons for different standpoints. The problem descriptions in the clinic project were a form of drawing attention in order to seek and be open for suggestions for change. The object of the problems also applied to the set up of the project as a whole. The describing of the problem and the effectiveness of the design process meant that the description of the circumstances within the clinic was limited. Formulated needs and problems were assessed against a background of each person’s familiarity with the activity about what was good and bad. Professional knowledge did not need to be presented in its entirety. The project dialogue took place against a background of what is usually referred to as silent knowledge and was concentrated to the reasons for and against the problematic conditions and the formulated proposals. A further means for sharpening attention was to create an overview and direction of course. That what was referred to in the project as nursing chains was an object for the project dialogue. It successively became a linguistic tool for identifying and penetrating deeper into the problem area with regard to patient environment, working environment and rational health care. In the combined whole, as constituted by the surgical activity at the orthopedic clinic, the participants were able to use the expression nursing chain as a reference to the clinic’s activity. The expression nursing chain was coined as a common theme for dealing with and communicating nursing knowledge and project knowledge. This was a systematic and easy to oversee means of creating understanding and make it possible for others to accept the message and descriptions in order to work with a partially undeveloped sphere of concepts for changes in the clinic environment. During the project meeting the descriptions were revised and developed in such a way so that everybody at the same time could understand the context in which the participants were referring the problem descriptions. “The participants in the dialogue” in the project are in the main employed representatives for various professional organizations. At the same time it is an exception that for instance the client and end user belong to the same organization. It is not always clear to what degree the user or the users’ representatives can participate in order to gain influence in the built environment. The arguments for user orientation set out are ideal types and are used as tools in order to investigate the proposals or factual user orientation. The problem-oriented projects investigated user orientation with the motive that this can provide satisfaction for the participants. This can lend legitimacy to the public activity and make it effective. The power of the users can increase in relationship to the managerial administration as well as improving its service. With regard to the problem-oriented projects carried out, the arguments for user orientation have been used for emphasizing the staff as users in construction projects. Chapter six (6) is the concluding chapter in this thesis and sets out assets that can lead to action in project dialogues. This draws attention to the users’ possible assets for active contribution in project dialogues from their own perspectives. At the same time this constitutes a termination of chapter five with the argument that user participation in the project dialogue is legitimized in the agreements between the various parties at the places of work. The intention of describing the course of the project dialogue in these investigations has been a means for drawing special attention to the users’ opportunities for participation in the regulation of the problem and product determination. The concrete situations have been marked by the participants’ assets, both experience-related and action-related, in the social context, linguistic context and the more tangible physical environment. With both everyday language and professional jargon, including experience generating linguistic actions, the participants have regulated the project dialogue with terms and concepts, which have been common for both general descriptions and more professionally oriented precisions. The employees’ prerequisites are regulated in the briefing activity that the developer and the representatives of the users of the premises for the activity in question are capable of constituting and organizing. The investigation of the problem-oriented projects shows that the employees’ action-related assets in the project dialogue are fostered by the following factors: opportunities for collaboration with the detail-design team, having access to ones own and others’ descriptions of ones own activity, and employees or their representatives having access to a formal and proper participation procedure that is firmly rooted in a program for project dialogues. In conclusion it can be stated that it is the reports pertaining to the theory of knowledge with references to conditions for description that maintain the argument that professional jargon is a usage of more thorough rules for the use of words that already exist in everyday language, and it is therefore that there does not exist any fundamental contrast between everyday language and professional jargon. It is mutual relationships between fundamental concepts and expressions that make it possible to carry out descriptions in everyday language that have a general validity. If there were not any possibilities for objective descriptions in everyday language it would at the same time be meaningless to claim that science and other professional languages utilize worlds and concepts more precise than as is the case with everyday language. It would be contradictory to develop the regulation of project dialogues to ones own specialized activity language as project dialogues often encompass different activity languages and professional jargon, which is undergoing continual and in certain cases extreme development. Therefore in final conclusion it is advocated here that a robust regulation of project dialogues should find its expression in everyday language as a general language fellowship.