International airports are the vista of post-industrial society. They form a world where disciplined crowds noiselessly move around in a carefully constructed ambience of orderliness, luxury and perfection. It is a world that commands respect for its underlying organizational ingenuity and mass psychological insight, and for the material subtlety of its design. Nothing may be reminiscent of the chaos, arbitrariness and dangers of the world beyond customs Everything is under control and, at the same time, full of promise: we have left, but we have not yet arrived Things have yet to happen; time, for the moment, is suspended.

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International airports are the vista of post-industrial society. They form a world where disciplined crowds noiselessly move around in a carefully constructed ambience of orderliness, luxury and perfection. It is a world that commands respect for its underlying organizational ingenuity and mass psychological insight, and for the material subtlety of its design. Nothing may be reminiscent of the chaos, arbitrariness and dangers of the world beyond customs Everything is under control and, at the same time, full of promise: we have left, but we have not yet arrived Things have yet to happen; time, for the moment, is suspended.

Please download the PDF to read the full text