Abstract
That architecture embodies a “language” whose shapes and forms can be read and interpreted as signs, symbols or texts is a long-established conception. The same goes for the view that it possesses a “rhetoric” the schemata, figures and configurations of which are able to impress and overwhelm viewers and users. Political architecture has always used this capability to express its claim for power and domination with significant forms. In modern and postmodern political architecture the “classical language of architecture” is replaced by a reduced and modified language of forms which exposes new technologies, constructions and materials in a special way and prefers such features as size, height and monumental basic forms. The inclusion of nature and the compatibility with it plays an increasing role in support of “political correctness”. The chapter describes this process from the post-war period to the present on the basis of selected examples.
