A city has never been merely a cluster of buildings within a concrete framework. Rather, it has always been a living organism that reflects its people — growing with them, evolving alongside their customs, traditions, and their relationship with space and time. As Patrick Geddes — a biologist and pioneer in urban planning — describes, the city is “more than a place in space, it is a drama in time.” It tells a collective narrative of identity, a long and intricate story of its inhabitants.

Yet today, as we move from one Iraqi city to another, we are rarely surprised. The same streets, the same...

A city has never been merely a cluster of buildings within a concrete framework. Rather, it has always been a living organism that reflects its people — growing with them, evolving alongside their customs, traditions, and their relationship with space and time. As Patrick Geddes — a biologist and pioneer in urban planning — describes, the city is “more than a place in space, it is a drama in time.” It tells a collective narrative of identity, a long and intricate story of its inhabitants.

Yet today, as we move from one Iraqi city to another, we are rarely surprised. The same streets, the same colors, the same rows of buildings — as if they all emerged from the same mold. Has architectural sameness become an unavoidable fate, or is it the product of choices and practices that can be examined and questioned?

In the waves of rapid urban expansion, the logic of efficiency has overshadowed the philosophy of diversity. New neighborhoods are planned as repetitive grids of housing units, with intersecting streets, symbolic green spaces, and similar facades that leave no room for wonder — monotony becomes the dominant character of the urban landscape.

Architecture, in today’s reality, is no longer a dialogic language between human and environment — no longer an equation defined by the boundaries of space. Instead, it has become a global language spoken by buildings that do not engage with their human context.

This phenomenon is echoed by Christian Norberg-Schulz, the Norwegian architect and architectural theorist, who asserted: “The more universal a design becomes, the more it lacks soul.”

In the absence of diversity, the city shrinks into a manual of regulations rather than a living fabric that invites life and interaction. Thus emerged, in academic discourse, the term urban cloning.

To answer the question of when identity was lost, we must realize: identity does not disappear suddenly — it is neglected in stages. When we copied the patterns of modern Gulf or utilitarian Western architecture, we did not ask whether these forms reflected our environment, suited our climate, or pleased our eyes that were raised on courtyards, arches, and shadows.

Architecture was reduced to a “modern appearance,” and a “good house” became one that resembled foreign magazines, not one that resembled its owners. Here we recall Peter Eisenman’s statement: “The real issue of architecture is not the form, but the content.” The content of place disappeared along with the relationship between material and surrounding environment, and between human and space.

Urban sameness may appear to be a design issue, but in essence, it reflects the dominance of economic logic in the planning process. Development companies seek profit and prefer repetitive designs because they are cheaper and faster. Regulatory bodies impose unified standards that restrict the architect's freedom and limit innovative proposals.

The result is rows of housing compounds repeating themselves mindlessly. Commercial centers appear with identical logos, cafés with the same furniture, and glass facades indistinguishable from one another. Cities are being stripped of their uniqueness, heritage, history, and cultural identity — much like what happened in cities such as Rome, which has faced identity erosion under the weight of modernity; or Istanbul, which, despite its rich heritage from the Byzantine to the Ottoman era, has in recent decades undergone chaotic urbanization, with many historical buildings replaced by commercial complexes and skyscrapers disconnected from the city’s cultural context. Even historic Cairo, especially its Fatimid and Mamluk quarters, has suffered gradual decay due to unplanned urban sprawl and the neglect of heritage value. Old Baghdad, with its courtyards, souks, and domed mosques, has similarly seen the deterioration of its identity under the pressures of neglect, conflict, and planning decisions detached from history. Heritage buildings have been replaced by faceless concrete blocks. The once "City of Peace" has turned into a silent mass of grey.

What remains is a visually neutral environment, lacking the local flavor that once gave each city its own personality.

Yet, escaping this monotony is not impossible. The city’s uniqueness and distinction can be restored, but only if we recognize that urban planning must be a cultural act, not just a technical or bureaucratic one. Not merely a process delegated to a draftsman or, in local jargon, the khalfa.

We must empower universities and research centers to offer planning solutions rooted in the specificity of place. Local authorities must adopt flexible mechanisms that encourage architectural diversity. It is also vital to revalue local materials and building traditions that form part of a city’s cultural memory and identity.

Frank Gehry once said: “Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness.” And what is timelessness if not authenticity?

In the end, the matter is not about whether buildings are beautiful or ugly, but whether people feel belonged in the spaces they inhabit. Do they feel that the city speaks for them — or are they just actors on a stage without an audience?

Cities are never neutral. They pulse with the memory of their people. Urban sameness is not a fixed destiny — it is the result of decisions that can be revisited.

Frank Lloyd Wright captured this vision eloquently: “A good building is not one that hurts the landscape, but one that makes it more beautiful than it was before.”

Let us, then, dream of cities that add beauty to life — cities that reflect their people, not each other.